Exposing the Illusion
of the
Campaign
for
Fundamental Right
to
Education
Written by
Selena George and Shilpa Jain
December 2000
Exposing the Illusion of the
Campaign for Fundamental Right to Education
Selena
George and Shilpa Jain
Shikshantar:
The Peoples’ Institute for Rethinking Education and Development
Udaipur,
Rajasthan, INDIA
Copyleft*
December 2000
The
‘Resisting the Culture of Schooling Series’ is dedicated to highlighting
various ways in which people are creatively struggling against dehumanizing and
exploitative Education and Development/Globalization. It will feature essays,
stories, poems, dramas, art, music, etc. in a number of languages (Mewari,
Hindi, English). To learn more about or
to contribute to the series, please contact Shikshantar.
* Portions of this document may be
freely reproduced with the source and authors acknowledged.
The Ten Commandments of the Campaign for Fundamental Right to
Education
(and our critiques of them)
Schools demean
individuals full potential, their diversity, creativities, intelligences,
learning styles, knowledges, languages, etc.
Nor can schooling guarantee employment in today’s cut-throat,
competitive world.
The ‘head start’ is greatest for those who
have paid most for their academic degrees.
Schooling reinforces many of the oppressive
structural aspects of society and generates dehumanizing fear and competition.
Schooling prevents individuals and
collectives from challenging and changing the macro-level System and its
micro-level manifestations to create better worlds for humanity.
6. “We see these problems, but we advocate for good quality schools: alternatives.”
Alternative schools still perpetuate the
oppressive and selective model of Development and Progress.
7. The Campaign for Fundamental Right to Education promises
equality, justice, peace, and democracy through universal elementary education.
The Campaign presumes that all Indians require
a system of schooling in order to live with dignity, and does not recognize
schooling as a violation of human dignity.
8. The Campaign is fighting on behalf of the people, who desire
education for all.
The Campaign undermines local dialogues on
urgent foundational questions by distracting our attention, energy, and
resources and by trying to shove a prescriptive, closed agenda down our
throats. It benefits those who thrive on the schooling industry.
9. Education is a universal, human right that every country’s
government must ensure.
Though it tries to stand on a moral high
ground, Education is a Big Business, driven by a nexus of
State-Market-NGOs-Academia, who profit greatly from the proliferation of
schooling and who disregard human diversity and human dignity.
10. Without Education, there cannot be Development
and Progress.
The dominant
model of Development and Progress dehumanizes the world’s social majorities and
destroys the webs of life and living wisdoms. To paraphrase Gandhiji, something
must be horribly wrong with a system of Education that fails to question,
challenge, and change this Model.
Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education
that shall be given to their children.
— Article 26, Universal
Declaration of Human Rights, 1948
The State shall endeavour to provide, within a period of ten
years from the commencement of this Constitution, for free and compulsory
education for all children until they complete the age of fourteen years.
— Article 45, Directive Principles of
State Policy,
Constitution of India -
Part IV, 1950
After a child completes 14 years, his or her right to
education is circumscribed by the limits of the economic capacity of the State
and its development. —
Article 41, Directive Principles of State Policy,
Constitution
of India - Part IV, 1950
State parties shall promote and encourage international
co-operation in matters relating to education, in particular with a view to
contributing to the elimination of ignorance and illiteracy throughout the world and facilitating access to scientific and
technical knowledge and modern teaching methods. …particular account shall be
taken of the needs of developing countries.
— Article 28, Convention
on the Rights of the Child, 1989
We recognise that the aspirations and development goals of our
countries can be fulfilled only by assuring education to all our people, a
right promised both in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and in the
constitutions and law of each of our countries.
— Education for
All Summit Of Nine High-Population Countries, Delhi Declaration,
December 1993
The costs of educational deprivation are incalculable. Denial
of the right to basic education undermines efforts to reduce child and maternal
mortality, to improve public health and nutrition, and to strengthen
opportunities for more secure and productive livelihoods. Democracy and good
governance cannot flourish in a situation where large sections of the
population are excluded from participation as a result of illiteracy…investment
in education is the key to more rapid and more equitable growth upon which
sustained poverty reduction depends.
— Education
International, The Global Action Plan for Education, March 2000
Education is at the heart of development.
— DFID, Education
For All — The Challenge of Universal Primary Education, March 2000
Education is a fundamental right of every person; a key to
other human rights; the heart of all development; the essential prerequisite
for equity, diversity and lasting peace.
— World Education Forum, Education For
All: All For Education, A Framework for Action, Dakar, April 2000
Both ‘lifelong
education’ and ‘lifelong learning’ have come to represent in different ways the
expectations that societies now have of education and of the scope that should
be provided for every individual to develop his or her potential.
— UNESCO, The Right to Education: World
Education Report, 2000
In all of the above pronouncements,
one message is clear: We have a panacea for our socio-economic ills and it is
EDUCATION. This akshayapatram1
has the power to eradicate poverty, eliminate gender/racial discrimination,
protect against violations of the individual, prevent environmental
degradation, halt escalating rates of population growth, resolve health and
livelihood problems, ensure tolerance and justice, promote democracy and
development, and maintain human dignity.
So potent is education that it is decreed a human right in the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights. From this,
one can infer that universalizing education will lead to liberty, equality,
justice and peace for all.
Notably, in all these
claims, the unwritten, underlying assumption is that ‘education’ equals
schooling.2 Indeed, in most internationally ratified
conventions, an individual’s (or family’s) choice of kind of education, outside
of schooling, is acceptable only if it conforms to “minimum educational
standards, as laid down or approved by competent authorities” (read: Education
is only that which is State-defined.)3 These pronouncements have effectively
declared schooling to be the only (and most supreme) means of education. Thus, in essence, schooling is being
declared a Human Right. Or, in the case
of India, there is a move to make it a Fundamental Right in the
Constitution.
The notion of
Human/Fundamental Rights itself grows out of a particular sense of human
dignity, one based upon protecting individuals and their property vis-à-vis the
State, the Market, and each other.4 This idea of ‘rights’ has achieved
prominence today, because of a proliferation of the modern institutions it
emerges from (i.e. the Nation-State, industrial economy, etc.) and because of
the materialistic vision of Progress and Success it corresponds to (which is
part and parcel of these institutions). Since schooling is dependent upon these
modern institutions, and since it professes to deliver such Progress, it can
‘naturally’ be considered a Human Right.
Underlying this assumption is the belief that schooling is the only way that every human being can freely avail of
the fruits of Development.5
For three centuries now,
there seems to have been an ‘international consensus’ on the magical,
transformative potential of schooling, given its notable role in both building
modern European nation-states and in intensifying their colonial
enterprises. Over the last 50 years,
mass schooling (formal and non-formal) has figured prominently in the various
nation-building exercises of developing countries. In the Project of Third World Development, for example, schooling
and literacy have been universally accepted as reliable, rational, verifiable
and significant “development indicators.”
Moreover, across the political spectrum, both the Left and Right alike
are reiterating the formula that schooling is a prerequisite for Development.
Political energy, along with large amounts of (borrowed) money, has been spent
on the education system’s infrastructure and salaries, to try to make this
formula work. Today, in the mounting
panic that Progress remains a mirage for the social majorities of the world,
schooling has again emerged — like an oasis in the desert — to become a major
issue on international and national agendas.
For over a decade,
international campaigns for universalizing education6
in developing countries have highlighted priority areas of school access,
equity, and quality, or school enrollment, retention and completion for all
(adult and child). However, most governments have been unable to meet these
targets, despite the aid of international donor agencies, private sector
groups, and local and international non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Now, in India, the ‘international consensus’
is being re-echoed in the ongoing “Campaign for Fundamental Right to
Education,” steered by the National Alliance for Education as a Fundamental
Right.7 The Alliance draws its mandate from the
Indian Constitution and from current international campaigns (like Education
for All) that are promoting the right to universal, compulsory schooling. In the Campaign, NGOs have joined hands with
self-proclaimed philanthropic corporations to ensure that the State will no
longer drag its feet in achieving universal schooling for all.
Citing poor quality as
the new culprit, the Campaign’s strategy includes altering the existing
schooling structure in favor of non-formal or alternative school reform
initiatives, in addition to expanding access/enrollment. According to them,
reforms for qualitatively superior schooling means increasing supplies of what
already exists — more and “better” teachers, trainers, curriculum,
infrastructure, textbooks, uniforms, slates and chalk, etc. — which can
conveniently be purchased from the ‘socially sensitive’ corporate sector. This reform strategy demands greater
expenditure and therefore more resources.
Thus, the need of the hour is portrayed as immediate relief from
resource crunches — via debt relief and grants from global donors and corporate
organizations — so that developing countries, like India, can more easily buy
good quality education for all. What is
being pushed is a State-Market-NGO nexus that claims to be serving the good of
humanity.
However, in the face of growing violence, inequity and
poverty, environmental catastrophe, widespread exploitation, finite resources
and the massive consumer needs of the North,8 a blind faith in the empowering potential
of schooling should be suspect. In
fact, an analysis of global exploitative regimes and transnational
socioeconomic dynamics reveals a covert but conscious effort by the North to
retain and expand its control over the ‘fruits of Development’. Schooling
supports this effort to re-colonize by providing a ‘neutral’ veil behind which
the North can pursue its dehumanizing and destructive agenda. In this paper, we
seek to contest the prevalent notions of the Campaign for Fundamental Right to
Education by advancing the following arguments:
(1) The
culture of schooling9
is a violation of our human dignity (where dignity is a concept much more broadly understood than
that in the narrow discourse on ‘rights’).
(2) The
Campaign mode undermines regenerative local dialogues on urgent foundational
questions by
distracting our attention, energy and resources and by trying to shove a
prescriptive/closed agenda down our throats.
(3) The
human rights agenda is inextricably linked to a vision of Development and
Globalization that fundamentally violates pluralistic notions of human dignity
and human life.
As Wolfgang Sachs has aptly described, “There is only one thing worse than the
failure of conventional development: namely, its untrammeled success.”10
By exploring these three
arguments in detail, we hope to encourage others to reflect on the Campaign for
Fundamental Right to Education. At the
end of this paper, therefore, we offer a few questions for discussion, which
will hopefully further enhance the questioning, dialogue, and action necessary
for re-considering one’s understanding of and involvement with the Campaign.
We would also like to
make it clear that we are not pro-market technophiles, trying to ‘deprive the
poor’ of their due. Nor are we anti-state naxalites, who seek to ‘blow up’ the
world. (Unfortunately, these categories have been created by people who are
invested in the State, to allow them to hold their moral and intellectual
ground and thereby silence debate.) Nor, in criticizing schooling, are we
advocating exploitative child labor or abuse.11 Rather, we are seeking to highlight the fact
that, in the last fifty years, in India, there has not been a serious
assessment of schooling.12 While we are inundated by rhetoric of how
advantageous schooling is for the individual and for society, analyses on its
harmful, destructive effects are conspicuously absent. By isolating schooling
in a tower of goodness, we have effectively negated all other perspectives,
understandings and conceptualizations of human learning.
In this critical analysis
therefore, we hope to open up spaces for an insightful and balanced dialogue
within the Campaign about the implications of constitutionally ratifying
Education as a Fundamental Right. Not only will such a dialogue allow us to
reflect on the detrimental effects of schooling (and its promise of
Development) on society, but it will also enable us to rethink how we are
utilizing our valuable time and resources.
Understanding the Myths
Declaring schooling a fundamental right is justified by the
campaigners on several different grounds.
For one, schooling is said to increase every individual’s life chances.
Schools are presented as places that hone the capabilities of each child; they
give knowledge in different areas (reading, writing, science, maths, art,
socially useful productive work, etc.) to develop children’s thinking power,
creativity, self-esteem, skills, etc.
Through schooling it is assumed that children will obtain the necessary
knowledge and skills to acquire gainful employment to last their lifetimes. In
this way, schooling is said to help the individual succeed on two levels: a) to
explore one’s psychological needs (i.e. for knowledge, creation, confidence,
etc.) and b) to gain access to opportunities for sustaining one’s physical
needs (i.e. jobs which give money to buy food, clothing, shelter, etc.).
Significantly, schooling promises everyone the same opportunity to increase
their life chances. It is assumed to be a neutral and objective process, in
which every individual is equal, is treated the same, and is evaluated by the
same criteria (merit). One only needs
to work hard to succeed in school to thereby maximize his/her life chances.
Second, schooling as a system is said to be of great benefit
to society. In schools, the argument goes, children are taught to treat each
other as equals. Schooling breaks down class barriers and brings diverse
children together in the same space, encouraging tolerance and appreciation for
differences. It also teaches children about societal norms, helping them grow
up to be good citizens and good leaders. It is expected that only with the
sensitivity and knowledge obtained in school are adults able to participate
effectively in the democratic exercises of their countries.
Lastly, schooling is said to be an empowering process. It
claims to cultivate in children a scientific temper that seeks and searches,
instead of foolishly accepting the superstitions prevailing in the
‘ill-letterate’ world. Exposed to a wide range of Scientific information and
‘Truth’ that would otherwise be inaccessible to them, children are better
equipped as adults to understand and actively participate in the world around
them. Such information is the key to transforming oppressive and discriminatory
relationships in their communities.
But does schooling
increase the life chances of each individual? Does it guarantee employment or a
bright future? Does it eliminate
inequalities and hierarchies? Does the information and process of schooling
‘empower’ one to challenge and change exploitative and unjust systems? By
taking each of these promises/assumptions about schooling in turn, it becomes
clear that all that glitters is not
gold. Far from being a cure-all, schooling
in fact produces, reinforces and expands the many socioeconomic ills that
plague the world today. To call it a
fundamental right ensures its maya and
prevents it from being interrogated and unmasked as the dehumanizing and
destructive force it is.
Unmasking the Myths
Schooling Does Not Increase One’s Life Chances
Far from developing children’ thinking power, creativity,
self-esteem, skills, etc., schooling stands as an obstacle to achieving one’s
full potential.13 Schooling teaches confusion, emotional and intellectual
dependency, and provisional self-esteem.14 It promotes the
view that all children are basically like clay or empty vessels and, through a
system of rewards and punishments, can be conditioned to fit a standard
mold. Schooling also cultivates a
number of debilitating feelings within children: a mistrust of intimacy, a hate
for solitude, a sense of cruelty and competition, a materialistic attitude,
passiveness, timidity in the face of the unexpected, etc. Children acquire poor concentration skills
and a poor sense of the past and the future in schools. This potent combination makes children
indifferent to the adult world and to the future, indifferent to almost
everything except the diversion of toys and violence.15 Schooling’s inculcation of psychological
impotence and dependency suppresses and humiliates the inherent genius of
children and “alienates them from their own human nature.”16
Further, schooling ignores, negates, and demeans
intelligences, knowledge systems, making-meaning systems, and learning styles
that do not fit within its parameters. For example, a number of multiple
intelligences have been identified by cognitive scientists/psychologists. These
include intrapersonal, interpersonal, logical, spatial, natural, verbal,
musical, kinesthetic, spiritual, emotional, creative, etc.17 Yet,
schooling denies the existence of all of these intelligences in each and every
one of us. Furthermore, its emphasis on superficial info-knowledge — cramming
us full of rote facts and mindless trivia — makes a mockery of what it means to
be fully human.18 Nor is there any real space for creativity, for local
languages/expressions, nor for exploring a variety of relationships or other
kinds of settings.
The culture of schooling drills into each child that there
is only one definition of success — to make it to the top of the
status-power-control ladder and dominate others. Of course, to get to the top, one must compete. Pitching child against child, schooling
reinforces the notion that life is a huge race against every other individual
and if one wants to win, they better be ready to fight against and crush
everybody else.19 Via relentless
grading, ranking and marking, year after year, schools label each child a
“topper”, “average” or a “failure”. This labeling is done according to narrowly
defined, externally-moderated and imposed criteria that do not take into
account the unique capabilities of each child.
Instead, schooling successfully instills in children a preference for
and reliance on competition. It is a
lesson that (not unintentionally) connects to the dominant economic
model/Global Market, which thrives on the principles of cut-throat competition
and hierarchy. The lesson continues long after one stops attending school, to
pervade one’s understanding of living and interacting in society. Schooling
thus succeeds in producing egotistical, competitive individuals, whose life
patterns divide them from one another and weaken collaborative ways of
relating.
Schooling Does Not Guarantee Jobs or a Bright Future
Similarly, the promise of a job — much less a livelihood —
is illusory. After trudging through
years of schooling and spending ill-affordable money, most educated youth are either
under-qualified for the employment they desire, or they are unable to find work
in the degree-glutted labor market.20 For example, in
India, in 1993-94, the rate of unemployment in urban areas was 58.6% for
schooled men and 72.5% for schooled women; the rate of unemployment in rural
areas was 60.4% for schooled men and 57% for schooled women.21 Not
only are jobs being eliminated due to government and corporate down-sizing, but
without a ‘jack’ or a ‘donation’ (i.e., influence or a bribe), a job is largely
unattainable. And since schooling has
denied youth knowledge and practice of traditional livelihoods — or has
conditioned them to believe that such activities were below them — they are
left with few other options to sustain themselves.22 Thus, for many, schooling has failed to
deliver on the promise of ‘better life chances.’ In fact, the statistical
and positive co-relation between education and employment/equity/poverty
alleviation/health/democracy is seriously questionable in the face of grassroots
realities. What is evident is that
over the past 50 years, growing levels of school enrollment/completion have
been accompanied by overall increases in inequality, unemployment, poverty,
vulnerability (political, economic, social, physical).
Schooling Does Not Eliminate Inequalities or Hierarchies
Far from fulfilling the promise of “building a free, just,
and tolerant society,” schooling actually encourages inequality, injustice, and
exploitation.23 It reinforces many
of the oppressive structural aspects of society. In fact, the least children learn from school (irrespective of
whether they go or not) is that they are not as good as other children who have
more, in terms of money, power and status.
It is a vicious cycle. Access to
the Game and movement up the power-status-control ladder depends upon one’s
academic qualifications, which in turn depend upon the level of wealth and
power one has to obtain those qualifications. The ‘head start’ is greatest for
those who have paid the most for their academic degrees (i.e., those who attend
elite schools and universities).24 According to
Everett Reimer (1972), “While economic status is largely a function of the
level at which a student drops out, power in society depends more upon the
sorting that occurs when high school graduates enter college…State and local as
well as national hierarchies are the products of the college lottery. Even international agencies are ruled by the
graduates of a dozen world-famous universities.”25
This type of segregation is also promoted at the
international level. “Obligatory schooling… grades the nations of the world
according to an international caste system. Countries are rated like castes,
whose educational dignity is determined by the average years of schooling of
its citizens, a rating which is closely related to per capita gross national
product, and much more painful.”26 Thus, instead of ensuring tolerance, justice and humility,
schooling actually promotes the segregation, oppression, and maintenance of the
status quo.
Schooling Does Not ‘Empower’ One to Challenge/Change the
System
Today, empowerment is predominantly defined in terms of the
amount of control and power one has to negotiate within the formal Market and
State frameworks. Schooling promises to
lead to the empowerment of the world’s social majorities by increasing their
capacity to collect resources to operate in these venues — be they monetary
resources (income), technology, or
info-knowledge. (Note: These are the
only three resources recognized by the Market and State, and therefore are the
only three desired today). The
relationship between schooling and empowerment is as follows:
(1) schooling helps one to acquire the resources demanded by
the State and Market;
(2) schooling therefore enables one to become part of the
mainstream; (3) that being part of the mainstream/status quo is the same as
being ‘empowered’.
In convincing people that the way to Progress is to amass
enough wealth, technology gimmicks, and knowledge (as defined by the System) in
order to be part of the elite, schooling thus ensures that they uphold the
status quo. When the ‘four-fifths
world’ is indoctrinated with the myth that they too can be part of the ‘one-fifth
world’27 if they go to school and work hard,28 these
products of schooling end up defending the very System that denies them freedom
and lives of dignity. They become economic units instead of human beings, constantly striving to deliver
their ‘best’, so as to more quickly scramble up the power-status-control ladder
and join the ranks of the elite. The
needs of the oppressive market economy and the greed of the North — for
products, efficiency and constant consumer supply — are thereby unwittingly
(and more than adequately) fulfilled by the prototype obedient
‘worker-consumer-citizens’ who never make it up the ladder.29 In other words, schooling inculcates the
view that economic productivity and consumption are the symbols of true
Development and human beings are the means to this end (as ‘commodities’,
‘resources’ or ‘capital’). The
dehumanization continues further, as each human being is ascribed a label
connoting different levels of ‘knowledge’ or ‘competence’, which in turn
command different market values.
Unfortunately, these assumptions demonstrate just how
schooling prevents individuals and collectives from really challenging and changing the macro-level System and its
micro-level manifestations to create better worlds for humanity. Schooling cements the status quo and breeds
a cynicism that ‘things are the way they are’ and eliminates both the
creativity and the commitment necessary to explore other possibilities. It rarely fosters the hope and conviction
that the world can be better and that we — whoever we are — have the power to
make it so. In fact, education, as it exists in schools, breaks the spirit of
both individuals and collectives. It
renders them insecure, helpless and vulnerable, dependent on schooling and its
partner institutions (the State, Market, etc.) and incapable of conceiving of
other possible arrangements for learning and growing.
Increasing the Potency of the Myths
Devaluing Local Spaces and Resources
Not only does schooling fail to deliver on the promises it
makes, but worse, it appropriates or devalues all other cultural, social,
political and economic spaces and resources. By homogenizing diverse, local
conceptualizations of living and organizing, it demeans or corrupts spaces that
previously strengthened community bonds of interdependence. This adulteration
of the local makes the myths more potent, because it eliminates the possibility
of achieving the same goals (i.e., exploring one’s full potential, ensuring a
livelihood, attaining equality and justice, and challenging and changing the
System) in other ways, through other relationships, and in other spaces.
For example, by restricting wisdom, meaning-making, and
knowledge to only superficial ‘info-knowledge’ or ‘G.K.’, children are loaded
with information utterly irrelevant to and often condescending of their social
realities. Thus isolated from any other knowledge systems for dialogue,
negotiation and understanding, outside of the curricular/conceptual framework
of schooling (or quiz shows like Kaun Banega Crorepati?), children begin to look at their parents, neighbors,
communities as ‘backward’, ‘illiterate’ and ‘ignorant.’ This arrogant attitude
further leads them to look down upon traditional livelihoods and
interdependent- and sustenance-oriented ways of living. In effectively removing these opportunities
for meeting one’s physical needs and for relating to others in more cohesive
and collaborative ways, schooling increases one’s dependency on jobs and money,
and therefore, on the government and market economy.
Efforts to promote pre-school and early childhood education30
signify a further appropriation of spaces for building social bonds, values,
relationships, knowledges, priorities, etc.
The responsibility and venue for children’s learning shifts from the
home and surrounding locality to the confines of the school. Along with Media, schooling also eats into
quality family time. Children now spend
over six hours a day at school, then use the remainder of their waking hours to
do homework and go for tuitions. Most
dialogue between parents/adults and children is confined to issues related to
school; other forms of interaction or relationship are rapidly
disappearing. Even at play, one of the
most popular games is “Teacher, Teacher”, where the children imitate a
classroom situation and test each other on math and other problems.31 The school, in short, has permeated the
daily life of the family and community, negating other valuable spaces for
living and growing. This negation is all the more unfortunate because no single
institution can support the vibrancy, diversity and interdependency of human
beings.
In this way, not only does schooling fail to keep the
promises it makes, but it also fundamentally undermines our individual and
collective human dignity. From
perpetuating competition and hierarchies, to instilling dehumanizing
categories, to infecting our relationships and understandings of the Self and
Community, schooling attacks the very essence of what it means to be
human. Indeed, anything that calls
itself ‘compulsory’ is anti-education,32 for it neither respects nor values a framework of human
dignity. Rather, schooling successfully breeds conflict, injustice, hate,
egoism, greed, and other qualities that deeply hinder our commitment to
humanity and compassion for one another.
Why ‘Alternative’/‘Non-formal’ Schools Do Not Challenge the
Myths
We anticipate that the
first response to the above criticisms will be, “We see these problems, but we are advocating for good quality schools,33
alternatives that will avoid the problems you describe and will succeed in
making the ‘myths’ come true. That is
what we are talking about when we call for Education to be a Fundamental
Right.” Indeed, for many, the
‘alternative good quality school’ or the ‘non-formal school’ card raises the
stakes as the only hope for achieving the promises of schooling. But what must be recognized is that alternative/non-formal schooling does not
differ substantially from mainstream schooling. Far from contesting the flaws inherent to the system of
schooling, they persist in legitimizing the processes, relationships, goals,
and values of the dominant model of schooling.
For example, the majority of alternative schools still:
- segregate
children by age groups and from real life;
- perpetuate
the myth of meritocracy, saying “everyone can succeed if they work hard”;
- insist
that learning occurs only within the space of school;
- impose
a set curricular pattern and label it ‘necessary’ or ‘basic’;
- offer
learners little autonomy in making decisions or governing their own
learning;
- believe
that teachers/facilitators have nothing
to learn;
- see
teachers as only those adult individuals who instruct in schools;
- do
not believe that learning can happen without the guidance of an expert;
- see
knowledge as a commodity;
- endorse
various measures of testing and competitiveness among students;
- define
‘success’ and ‘progress’ in terms of wealth, power, and status;
- isolate/negate
the local to over-emphasize the global;
- do
not critically question the hegemony
of Development, Western Science, Nation-State, the ‘Free Market’; and instead
increase dependency on these exploitative structures/institutions.
Though this list is not
exhaustive, it is illustrative of the various elements that compose the
‘culture of schooling’. We must clarify that there is a difference between
schools as physical places and schooling as a cultural framework. In theory, there is nothing wrong with the
idea of different people coming together in a space to share ideas, create,
discuss, learn, and grow.
Unfortunately, a ‘culture of schooling’ prevents such a real learning
process from occurring. Most importantly,
these elements come in an all-or-nothing package. Although individual alternative schools may claim to not practice
one (or even a few) of them, as long as they believe in even one element, then
at some level, they are accomplices to all of them.
For example, in almost
all ‘alternative’ initiatives, students are eventually mainstreamed back into
the modern political, economic and social system whose violence inspired the
so-called alternative. This expectation
mandates there be a level of conformity between the Education offered by the
alternatives and the Education offered by the mainstream. ‘Alternatives’ also
continue the class-based segregation of mainstream schooling, falling into two
categories: the expensive Woodstock and Doon Schools, which cater to wealthy,
elite children; or the Shiksha Karmi/NFE village schools for ‘poor’, rural
children. Both perpetuate the same
oppressive and selective model of Development and Progress and then fail to
deliver on the promises that education will bring this Success. In doing so, they violate human dignity on
multiple levels.
The language used in current global discourse on education
is similarly deceptive. Like
‘alternative’ schools, it too masks the fact that it is re-affirming the status
quo of schooling. At first glance, the
verbal changes seem to be considerable: schooling has been replaced by lifelong
learning, students are now called learners, and schools are packaged as
learning organizations. The linguistic effort apparently signals a shift from a
quantitative to a qualitative dimension/focus. Yet, like ‘alternative’ schools,
this word-play is also misleading.
Though cutting-edge language and words have been co-opted, the depth of
their meanings — and how they fundamentally challenge schooling — has been
missed. In fact, the ‘new’ words
continue to represent and function as the original terms; they delineate
processes, actors, and spaces that remain consonant with the current culture of
schooling and thus are a further attack on human dignity.
II. The Destructive Nature of the Campaign
By stressing that schooling
be universalized, the Campaign for a Fundamental Right to Education in India
seems to draw from the Education For All Campaign. Campaigning for Education to
be a Fundamental Right is problematic for several reasons. First, it spreads and legitimates the
violations of human dignity inherent to schooling. Ironically, it puts
schooling into the same league as ‘freedom of expression’ and ‘freedom of
association’, when schooling most often tramples on both of these freedoms. Second, it presumes that all Indians (and
all people, for that matter) require a system of schooling in order to live
with dignity. This assumption negates
informal modes of learning, demeans contextually-sensitive conceptualizations
of organizing life, and binds freedoms and choices. Implicit (and often explicit) in this claim is that parents,
localities, or other learning resources and spaces, are not as
good/significant/meaningful as schooling. Thus, encroaching on or eliminating
other spaces of learning is justified, because human beings are seen as
incapable of learning without schools.
In addition to its
content (or lack thereof), the Campaign mode itself is violent. By nature, a
campaign is an aggressive, target-oriented and planned method of social action,
designed to engage sections of society around a pre-defined issue. Campaigns
involve mobilizing mass public support through slogans and rhetoric, usually
emphasizing some idea of deprivation and/or injustice. They seek to force
action from the State or a similar institution, by showing signs that the
public is revolting out of disapproval of State motives or functioning and is
demanding a certain action. In this way, campaigns contain a fair degree of
militarism and self-righteousness. Typically, their assault on institutions is
often directed by select groups of people for particular ends.
For example, a
group of NGOs (Aga Khan Foundation, Bodh, CRY, ICICI, MV Foundation, National
Foundation for India, National Law School of India University, Pratham, PRIA,
UNICEF) is steering the National Campaign for Fundamental Right to
Education. The Campaign is trying to
force the State to make education a fundamental right, by passing the 83rd
Amendment Bill (now pending for a second reading in the Lok Sabha). To
accomplish its goal, the NGOs are networking amongst each other and appealing
in various parts of the country to gain more lobbyists for the Bill. The justification for the entire Campaign
rests on the promises enshrined in schooling.
The aggressive nature of
campaigning, however, produces several problems. First, it greatly restricts meaningful dialogue around the issue
in question. Opportunities for deeply
and critically inquiring into the rationale or implications of the demand are
denied, with the claim that such processes would reduce the momentum needed to
sustain public interest and support. Therefore, public contribution is limited
to ‘ticking the box’ or ‘signing the petition’; it rarely reaches the level of
thinking about, questioning, and discussing the so-called ‘injustice’ at hand.
The campaign is thus single-minded in its approach. Like a horse with blinders, it cannot see the road in the context
of the landscape. Using propaganda to promote one vision as the only answer, it thus prevents the emergence
of any other perspective on or understanding of the issue.
Limiting the space for
dissent, questioning, or other conceptual frameworks guarantees that energy and
resources will futilely and obstinately be invested in a particular
direction. By focusing on the ‘rights’
aspect, the National Campaign for Fundamental Right to Education thus
effectively diverts attention away from more foundational questions around
schooling, education and society. When
analyzing and discussing the problems of education, there is very little
exploration of what purposes education serves and very little reflection on
what has been achieved in these many decades. For example, it does not question
the rising incidences of suicide and depression in Kerala, despite its esteemed
status of having achieved a literary status of 93%. Nor is there any discussion about why prevalent notions of
education have failed; how education is connected to dominant notions of
Development, Progress, Science/Technology, the Nation-State; who benefits from
education and why; or any other seriously meaningful question. Not only is the landscape being ignored, but
one wonders what lies at the end of the road.
The oft-made
counter-argument to this critique is that, “We are not ignoring these
fundamental questions, but we can only address them after we achieve schooling
for all.” Or, “We do not need to a priori have a vision of Development or
a conception of Progress to advocate schooling for all. It will naturally follow from universal
schooling.” For the Campaign to condescendingly carry out its strategies and
assume that vision can be ‘fixed’ or decided later is like prescribing and
force-feeding medicine to people who have not been diagnosed with any
illness! It goes against the grain of
common sense, to formulate action before weighing its consequences, by ignoring
fundamental issues and not allowing space for adequate dialogue.
It also makes one wonder
in what vacuum the Campaign advocates are living. To disregard the deeply significant connections between
Schooling, Development, the Nation-State, Science, etc. is either a sign of naivete,
or ignorance, or apathy, particularly given the large amount of debate and
controversy surrounding these institutions. We need to think about their
functions, relationships, the various contexts they operate in, their goals and
purposes. We cannot continue to ignore or discard context without adequate
reflection. To do so would further bind us to certain structures and limit our
space for creative thought and action.
The shallowness and
haste of such counter-arguments make suspect the roles and motives of the
agents of the Campaign. Today, NGOs
(now calling themselves Civil Society Organizations) claim they represent the
masses, the social majorities, the ‘people’.
In this way, NGO participation at the round table satisfies the
requirement of ‘community involvement in decision-making and strategic planning
of education.’ But if the original
problem was that the Government (as the so-called ‘elected representatives of
people’) could not be trusted to focus on the real needs of people, then it is
quite ironic that any non-governmental group is unquestioningly
legitimate. NGOS, who expound their
opinions under the banner ‘of the people’, are neither elected nor chosen in
any way by the people they claim to serve/represent. How can they therefore be considered THE voice of the people?
It is even more ironic,
given that the work/projects of most NGOs stem from contracts with the
Government bodies or bilateral and multilateral donor institutions that aid and
abet the very System that perpetrates oppression. Indeed, the majority of NGOs are service-agents that breed dependency on
themselves, instead of being catalyzing agents that ‘empower’ people to be
independent of the State and Market. The sector has emerged as its own industry
— a powerful lobby that shapes its functioning according to which social agenda
is the most lucrative. For example, it
seems that many of the NGOs involved in the Campaign do not care about/believe
in it, much less understand the depth of its implications.36 It makes us wonder if they have simply
become signatories to the Campaign to pacify their donors.
If we can agree, even
partially, on the above problems of schooling and the campaign mode, then a
simple question naturally follows: Why the desire to see it declared a
fundamental right? To answer this, we
must recognize who benefits from the
expansion of schooling.
Education today is a Big
Business, one from which the corporate, government, donor, media, and
NGO-sectors all stand to profit. For example, the guidelines for the content of
education laid out in The Integrated Framework on Education for Peace,
Democracy and Human Rights (1995)
suggest that:
“It is necessary to
introduce into curricula, at all levels, true education for citizenship which
includes an international dimension… It would be desirable for the documents of
UNESCO and other United Nations institutions to be widely distributed and used
in educational establishments, especially in countries where the production of
teaching materials is proving slow owing to economic difficulties.”37
Who will benefit from
this worldwide distribution of textbook and curricular material is
obvious. It is worth billions of
dollars for the companies of the North, who will write, copyright, print, and
distribute the materials that will explain to our children what ‘true education
for citizenship’ is. It will also mean
submerging and thereby eliminating the indigenous curricular materials
production in countries, such that educational content reflects a Northern-bias
(often hidden propaganda) instead of a contextual base.38
In India itself, the
education sector consumes thousands of crores of rupees every year. Doing a few back-of-the-envelope
calculations, we see that, in one school year, the total market for uniforms is Rs. 3000 crores and for stationary is
Rs. 3000 crores.39 Add to this the costs of school
construction, school furniture, supplies, textbooks, not to mention teacher and
administrative staff salaries and
training, and it is clear that the business of schooling is a mammoth
enterprise.
The astute reader might
ask, “But why declare education a fundamental right? So long as the Education System is in place, won’t these sectors
(State, Market, NGO, etc.) still make their profits? Why should we care if they are pushing schooling as a ‘human
right’? What difference does it
make?” This question gets to the crux
of the problem. When education is
ratified in the Constitution as a fundamental right, the State will be forced
to increase the level of public subsidies it provides for the sector. This
increase will require a reduction in spending in other social sectors, an
increase in common taxes, and most importantly, the taking out of more
international loans. Further, in light
of the above analysis of the State-Market-NGO nexus, it is clear that these
public subsidies will mostly fill the coffers of private corporations and NGOs.
The private sector will make more profit in those countries whose governments
cannot deliver on the Fundamental Right, as there will be pressure on them to
open up their domestic Education market to foreign companies to provide the
‘necessary services’ (read: more globalization). And when every child must be
enrolled in schools, individual families and communities will also be forced to
increase their spending in this area.
In these ways, the Education Business will be ensured generations of profit.
There are other, more
subtle, implications of declaring education a fundamental right: First,
schooling is portrayed to be universal phenomenon, which consequently cements a
call for ‘global equality in education’.
Second, such a declaration legitimates and further entrenches a
particular vision of Globalization and Development, and therefore an entire
framework of rights, property, consumption, production, relationships, values,
etc. Thirdly, it opens the door to international
‘judgement and enforcement’. Examining
each of these outcomes in turn makes it clear the implications of the Campaign
are severe and must be challenged.
To call something a
‘Fundamental Right’ suggests that it is universal — a
characteristic/value/belief that all human
beings share, within and across various cultural, linguistic, national, ethnic,
racial, gender boundaries, and for all generations, past, present and
future. The problem with universalism
is not so much that it seeks out commonalities among human beings (which may
indeed be many) but that it presents these as unquestionable absolutes in which
all peoples must fit themselves.
Whether arising from a fear of difference or from a desire to unify all
humankind, such universalizing leaves little room for diversity, complexity,
conflict, creativity, and dialogue around serious questions about what it means
to be human or how we conceptualize reality.40
Thus, universalism posits the belief that everybody wants the same kind of life
and needs the same kind and amount of resources to exist, thrive and be at
peace.
When Education is presented as a universal, it can ‘legitimately’ eliminate the diversity of learning contexts and homogenize all individuals and collectives into one dominant model or vision of schooling. While Education For All at least made superficial commitments to the diversity and plurality of humankind and its conceptions of education, the National Alliance for Fundamental Right to Education wears no such mask. It categorically states that “factors impeding universalisation of elementary education are more social, political and cultural in nature.”41 In other words, peoples’ beautiful and rich differences are a problem, because they stand in the way of making one institution fit for all! But instead of recognizing that universalism is impossible in a climate of human diversity, the Alliance emphasizes large-scale replicable work. They further suggest a standardization of pedagogical techniques to ensure quality and equality of education in India — irrespective of contexts, languages, or communities.