Identifying Decision Variables in Tax Clinic Design: A Scoping Review

South Africa has a rich history of clinical education programmes. However, the same cannot be said of tax clinics. No prevailing literature could be found which reports on the use of tax clinics as part of an education programme at South African Universities. To change this status, the researchers embarked on a process of considering initiating a tax clinic at a university. As a preliminary phase, a scoping review was employed to identify the decision variables involved in initiating a clinical education programme at a university. This scoping review began with the researchers considering, in a pragmatic manner, what decisions would need to be made for the establishment of a tax clinic at a university. Decisions made in this respect were found to be substantially influenced by the clinic’s purpose and objectives. Examining the literature yielded three overarching categories of decisions associated with the design of such an initiative, namely, institutional decisions, target audience, and operational considerations. The paper presents a framework of these decisions.