South African Academic Development (AD) emerged as a liberatory educational and social movement in the 1980s. AD (often called educational development) has burgeoned as an international phenomenon, but with a focus on quality rather than on liberation. South African AD now seems to be struggling to construct its post-apartheid identity, if one considers the demise of the South African Association for Academic Development (SAAAD) in 2002 and the fragile state of its interim successor, the South African Academic Development Association (SAADA). This article gives an analytical account of the history of international and South African AD. It attempts to explain what has divided and weakened the latter and makes some recommendations for the future.