The mobility of the highly skilled, summarized as brain drain, brain circulation and brain gain, remains a contentious issue for policy. Even so, the evidence base to inform policy remains poor. This gap is of particular importance to policymakers in countries that experience brain drain. This paper reports on the findings of a tracer study of international African doctoral graduates of South Africa’s leading universities. Since access to student records was problematic, the sample frame was developed by the inspection of library holdings of dissertations. This approach allowed for a representative sample to be surveyed. Contrary to the expectation that the majority of graduates would depart from Africa as a brain drain, it was found that the majority returned home on completion. Some 10% remained in South Africa as a brain gain to the host country, with but 5% leaving Africa. The outcome of their temporary migration was brain circulation and talent development.

高技能人才的流动性，概括为人才流失，脑循环和脑力增长，仍然是政策上有争议的问题。即使这样，提供政策依据的证据基础仍然很薄。对于那些人才流失国家的政策制定者来说，这一差距尤为重要。本文报告了对南非领先大学的国际非洲博士毕业生进行的追踪研究的结果。由于访问学生记录存在问题，因此通过检查图书馆的学位论文来开发样本框架。这种方法允许对代表性样本进行调查。与大多数毕业生会以人才流失的方式离开非洲的预期相反，发现大多数毕业生在毕业后便返回家园。留给南非的人才大约有10％来自东道国，但有5％离开了非洲。他们临时迁移的结果是大脑循环和人才发展。