Negotiating Modernity: Sexuality Education as Cultural Governance in Sub-Saharan Africa

This review chapter examines how postcolonial education systems contest, translate, and govern global norms by synthesizing interdisciplinary scholarship on comprehensive sexuality education (CSE). We concentrated mainly on cases from Sub-Saharan Africa, specifically Ghana, Kenya, and Zambia, and extracted comparative insights from Southeast Asia. We argue that CSE is best understood as a form of cultural governance rather than solely as a public health or curricular intervention. Across contexts, sexuality education has become a focal point for political struggle over gender, youth citizenship, morality, and national sovereignty. Upon reviewing the scholarship, we identified four central patterns in the literature: the politicization of CSE through transnational anti-gender mobilization; the role of religious and moral authorities as key education governance actors; the vernacularization and hybridization of global sexuality education norms; and the central, yet under-theorized, role of teachers as moral intermediaries in implementation. By contextualizing African discussions within the larger dynamics of the Global South, we contest Eurocentric assumptions inherent in global CSE frameworks and underscore emerging deficiencies concerning digital misinformation, algorithmic influence, youth agency, and political economy. This chapter concludes by outlining a future research agenda for comparative and international education (CIE) that treats sexuality education as a critical lens for understanding global norm circulation, moral governance, and educational politics.