Indiscipline in South African Schools: the Parental / Community Perspective

South Africa is struggling with the problem of indiscipline in schools. The issue of indiscipline in South African schools has been subjected to research for almost two decades. This research has revealed that learner (in)discipline in a school is related to six sets of factors, namely learner-related factors, teacher-related factors, school-related factors, education system-related factors, parent-related factors, and society-related factors. All of these factors have now been researched in respect to the situation in South Africa, with the exception of the parent / community factor. The aim of this article is to report on research that was done regarding this outstanding factor with regard to learner (in)discipline in South African schools. The constructivist-interpretivist approach was employed, in order to recast information gleaned from available international literature into a theoretical framework. The South African context was then analysed by using the theoretical framework. It was found that within the parental-community factor in determining the state of learner-discipline in schools four sub-factors can be distinguished, namely parental style, parental model for example, family stress and parent-school relations. These have definite life-philosophical underpinnings, which are also outlined in analysing and interpreting the South African situation.