Neo-liberalsim: Its impact on Education and the Role of Educators Today

              Neo-liberalsim: Its impact on Education and the Role of Educators Today

 This year marks the 56^th Teachers’ day honouring the birthday of the great philosopher, statesman and teacher of teachers, Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan. It was he who said “instead of celebrating my  birthday it would be my proud privilege if 5 September is observed as Teachers’ Day. It was in 1962 that the first Teachers’ day was observed. 55 years have passed and India at 2017 is vastly different from what it was in1962. A new generation with new aspirations, new faith, new concerns, new goals, new interests, new approach to life and new ways of living is reminded of the Teacher of Teachers on this day.

 We are no longer the Nehruvian age with its focus on  a socialistic pattern of society. The present age is known as the Neo-liberal age and the word ‘neo-liberalism’ marks an idea that has brought about a shift in our perspectives on all issues that have a direct bearing on day to day life of every individual. Neo- liberalism  has almost a universal appeal irrespective of the tags appended to a nation, as developed or developing or under developed nation. This is a change that has taken roots in the 21^st century  and it is therefore imperative that we understand the implications of neo- liberalism  and its impact on education. It is worth recalling the wise statement of Radhakrishnan in this context. He said: “Before we can build a stable civilization worthy of humanity as a whole, it is necessary that each historical civilization should become conscious of its limitations and it's unworthiness to become the ideal civilization of the world.” The present article is an attempt to take cognizance of the change of a new world order and to make education continue to serve the cause of humanity in our times.

 Neo- liberalism is an old term that dates back to the 1930s and it has been resurrected in our current politics. It is a paradox that neo liberalism is not a revival of liberalism but it is a revolt against liberalism as it is a return to conservatism.   The post liberalization period in India in the ‘90s of the last century coincided with the third phase of globalization which made it easy for money to move from one market to another depending on which market provided maximum returns on investment. India moved from socialist rhetoric to join global capitalism. The liberalization of economy from the early’90s with assistance from IMF and World bank brought India to embrace capitalism.  The country saw the involvement of corporate money power in Indian politics today as a result of the liberalization of the Indian economy twenty five years ago.

After the 2008 financial crisis, neo-liberalism became a pejorative term criticizing the establishment for conceding its authority to market forces, thereby widening the chasm between the haves and the have-nots, giving rise to loathsome inequality. According to Stephen Metcalf, “The word has become a rhetorical weapon, but it properly names the reigning ideology of our era – one that venerates the logic of the market and strips away the things that make us human.” These are no doubt words of severe indictment.  Though a trifle exaggerated and hugely biased, there is a kernel of truth in Metcalf’s indictment as it has brought about a new way of looking at society and looking at individuals as  “profit and loss calculators”. Metcalf states “neo-liberalism is not simply a name for pro-market policies, but also a name for a premise that, quietly, has come to regulate all we practise and believe: that competition is the only legitimate organizing principle for human activity.”

The term neo-liberalism advocates privatization and free competition that would lead to excellence.  As an ideology, at the core it functions as the guarantor of our liberty, giving us the opportunity to raise our talent and potential and strive for excellence.  The idea behind free trade was to encourage competition that would lead to greater availability of goods at a more competitive price and thereby protect the poor against the rich. But the unfortunate truth is neo-liberalism and the monopolies it has encouraged has bred more of illiberalism and bigotry. What was intended to be a revolution in thought, has turned out to be an assertion and imposition of uniformity as demanded and dictated to by the corporate sectors. When the corporate interest is involved, it is the only one that matters and all other interests are set aside.

There is no denying the fact that Indian economy picked up post Liberalization, and there has been a huge increase in investments.  But the corrosive effect of neo liberalism has fallen on  education which is seen in the corporatization of education. Henry Giroux of Pennsylvania university explains how  “civic discourse has given way to the language of commercialization, privatization, and deregulation and that, within the language and images of corporate culture, citizenship is portrayed as an utterly privatized affair that produces self-interested individuals”.  This is a far cry from the core meaning and purpose of higher education which is to make young people engage with citizenship. What had been the earlier practice in universities and colleges of developing democratic, pluralistic and thinking individuals by inculcating the spirit of  unity among diversity has now been given up in favour of promoting self-centred individuals in pursuit of jobs for their personal progress.  In the era of neo-liberalism, there is a perceptible shift in the concerns and issues related to education. Katharyne Mitchell observes “This shift is directly linked with and helps to facilitate the entrenchment of neo-liberalism as it supports a privatization agenda, reduces the costs of social reproduction for the government, and aids in the constitution of subjects oriented to individual survival and/or success in the global economy.”  What is now mooted is turning out students to serve market forces and not as responsible citizens who can think and deliberate on issues that  relate to the welfare of fellow individuals and the society they live in. This can be best exemplified by an early Greek play The Clouds by Atistophanes( as cited by Martha Nussbaum in Cultivating Humanity,her book on Higher education) where a young man in search of learning  is confronted with two alternatives- (1) the traditional, conservative thinking on education which placed emphasis on discipline, memorisation and implicit acceptance of all that was taught, without questioning and (2)opposed to that, the new learning established by Socrates with its emphasis on learning to think analytically  the theories, norms  and concepts that  had come down through the ages and  on developing a questioning and critical mind to enquire into issues that related to Man and society. Those who belonged to the old school insisted on a disciplined approach to learning so that they evolved as robotic members of a well established, paternalistic and domineering, authoritarian society while the new school of  Socrates encouraged independent thinking, heedless of authority. Socrates Academy was burnt down and he was put on trial on charges of sedition. 

We are in a similar situation, caught up between the discipline imposed by market forces to serve their regulated commercial world and the freedom to debate, argue, analyze and act in the interest of the welfare of society and fellow beings.

Our present day education is  torn between a neo liberal state  that advocates uniformity and discipline with no scope for debate and argument as against a new orientation towards independent thinking and  linking education with issues that have a direct bearing on society, citizenship and generation of ideas to suit the new age. The resulting conflict has in a large measure contributed to apathy in teaching and total absence of interest and enthusiasm for learning. It has adversely impacted the teacher and the taught. This is seen more in higher education than in school education, though there are many other factors that have affected the latter.

 Neo liberalism paradoxically is a swing way from liberalism and towards conservatism that opposes change and innovation and prefers maintaining the existing, traditional order. The binary conflict between historians of the right and the historians of the left is a case in point. It has left young minds in confusion. It is sad that we have given in to the maxim ‘might is right’ and whichever party is in power thinks it is its right to impose history as seen from its point of view to the total suppression of the other. Earlier the progressives had overdone their ideology. It is time now for the conservatives to hit back. We  ee this binary conflict between the right and the left in the selection of texts for Humanities and Social sciences where ideology is the deciding factor. The scrapping of the essay of the celebrated author A.K.Ramanujan on Ramayana from B.A(Hons) course by Delhi university has conveyed to the students the wrong message that only the ideology that is supported by the majority will be accommodated. It is best to recall what Radhakrishnan said “Books are the means by which we build bridges across cultures.” The balance between the right and the left is severely dented and needs to be restored in our education. The present day crisis in education is one of non accommodation. There is no one ideology that is utopian in its reach. There has to be space for different ideologies to co-exist and this in turn promotes in the students objectivity, critical thinking and analytical reasoning to arrive at a well informed interpretation and judgement. The teachers whatever their ideological leanings are, they should try to give comprehensive lectures that present the different interpretations. I read about a brilliant young history teacher who introduced Indian history to her graduate students by speaking about a train journey. The passengers in a compartment had settled down when the train started. As the train reached the next station a few more passengers made their way into the compartment,  seeking a share of the space enjoyed by the early passengers. There was initial resentment and resistance and the seats were shared. This got repeated in the next stop and more passengers joined in. It was push and squeeze to occupy and share the limited seat. As the train chug chugged its way, the passengers settled down within the cramped space, started talking, opening their food packets and sharing their meals with one another. When the train arrived at its destination, the passengers before alighting, exchanged addresses and contact numbers to continue their friendship in the times to come. The students understood that this is the history of India fighting for its territory with Muslim invaders and Christian traders and emerging as a strong secular India accommodating  all those who were not Hindus.  The teacher in the neo- liberal age cannot allow his personal ideological bias to come in the way of an objective presentation of facts. Radhakrishnan believed that "teachers should be the best minds in the country". True teachers, he said,  are those who help us think for ourselves.

The problem singularly that is of India is its humungous population. As per the demographic profile of our country, youth constitutes one fifth of the total population. There is a great deal of pressure on the universities, colleges and schools to accommodate all eligible young students in these institutions. The PPP model (Private-public partnership) is indeed a welcome model. The private sector has to be an accommodating partner to share the vast growing number of students. But this is not happening. The fees are high in private institutions and beyond the reach of the poor.  Even in schools the fiat from the government for a compulsory 20% intake of the poor has not worked satisfactorily as there is no attempt to bring a genuine integration of students coming from economically and culturally weak backgrounds. The social divide has only widened and deepened. The private institutions have the resources to give quality education while the government institutions have to cater mainly to all classes that are not affluent and therefore left out.

The shrill orchestration to ban private universities is not the solution. Some of the universities are imparting quality education(not all private universities are good; most of them are profit making commercial ventures) as they have the funds to provide the best of facilities in their campus. As the Tamil proverb says , it is easy to demolish a nest than build a new one. Let us not make this mistake. What the government should do is to facilitate entry of students to top universities where the fees are also high. Instead of wasteful expenditure in building new colleges, new buildings, new auditoria etc, the government should ask the universities to identify brilliant students during the last two years of their school and give them provisional admission subject to their scoring the requisite eligible grades. These students should be provided scholarship to pursue their studies in the best private/government institution. This “Catch them young” strategy is followed in many top UK universities.
Government should facilitate MOOC(Massive Online Open Courses) to make learning material accessible to a vast number of students via web. Teachers have to be specially trained to prepare these online courses. The old form of teaching is good in a small class, but where there is an urgent need to provide for a humungous number of youth population, teaching with technology has to be insisted upon. New recruits to faculty positions have to be given training in using technology for imparting instruction.

Today there is a lot of talk about skill development and universities vie with one another to showcase their potential by introducing skill based courses as a part of the academic curricula. This has resulted in turning out graduates with no academic learning and no skill competency. What universities have to do is to enlist the private sector- the industry, manufacturing units, corporate offices, hospitals etc and (if need be), mandate them to take graduate students for skill training. We can follow the Japanese model where the student spends the first half of the day in the college/university and the second half with industrial units for skill training.  This will ensure that academic standards are maintained while the student gets adequate skills to be employable.

The role of the teachers in the neo liberal age has necessarily to change. Teachers can no longer be presenters of facts. In the age of internet, facts are available at the press of the keyboard. They have to be interpreters of facts and should arouse the curiosity in the students to learn more. They have to be creative teachers who have to find innovative methods to uphold the interest of the students. There is no point in complaining that the students have no interest in study; they come to colleges to pass time”etc.  The fault lies with the academic community as the lectures are uninspiring, pedantic and mechanical, often far removed from the interest of  the new generation which constantly asks for insta-satisfaction a la insta-coffee. Less lecturing hours, more mentoring time and more participatory sessions where the student is expected to present his views. Universities are not schools with a monotonous time table. Students have to be given time for self study and lectures have to be crisp, short and knowledge capsules. Time for a redefinition of the role of a teacher where s/he is more of a catalyst , activating the knowledge cell of the students.

Neo liberalism cannot be wished away.  True to the history of Ages, there will be a continuous cycle of ideologies. The socialist ideology has now been replaced by the neo-liberal ideology. It will run its course before it is replaced. But the goal of the universities remains the same. It is a place for generation of ideas. Let universities be the repository of ideas and not a crucible for ideologies. Neo liberalism has its positives and its negatives which is true of all ideologies. Universities have this problematic task of sifting the plusses from the minuses. Let the positives of competition, reaching after personal excellence, high aspiration for self- centred progress be synergized with social consciousness, empathy for fellow humanity and development of the society to make education serve the interests of the new world order.

In conclusion it will worth revisiting a few of the cardinal statements of Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan that have universal and all time validity:

“The end-product of education should be a free creative man, who can battle against  historical circumstances and adversities of nature.  ”

  “We must recall humanity to those moral roots from which both order and freedom spring.”

  “ A literary genius, it is said, resembles all, though no one resembles him.  ”

    “A life of joy and happiness is possible only on the basis of knowledge and science.”

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