When Arundhati Roy is Wrong and Capitalism Right
How Roy got the idea of Privatization of Education wrong, like most people
Author Arundhati Roy, in a press release on the 30th of August, 2018, made her views clear on a number of issues, including the assassination of journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh, the recent policies of Modi’s administration, and the increasing number of farmer suicides. She named this piece “#MeTooUrbanNaxal.’
Addressing the simultaneous raids on activists, lawyers, and poets a few days before that on “ludicrous” charges “with little or no paperwork,” and the subsequent arrests of five of them, who were later accused of plotting violence at the Edgar Parishad rally and of plotting to kill Prime Minister Modi, she said that none of them were present at the rally on December 31st, 2017.
She concluded by saying: “The vulnerable are being cordoned off and silenced. The vociferous are being incarcerated. God help us get our country back.”
This last sentence evidently has a sense of hopeless despair, and is tinged with a conviction that many of us can identify: that we are being led astray from the course it had been agreed we take, onto a slippery path that will plunge this nation into an abyss from which there is no possible return. But that is not it.
There is another, more disconcerting statement in her press release. Denouncing demonetization, GST (Goods and Services Tax), and other ill-conceived policies that were imposed upon us (whose worst victims were actually poor people whom these policies had claimed to better), Ms Roy said that the way universities are being dismantled is “arguably the saddest thing of all.” And before moving to another topic, she ended this one with:
“Finally, the privatization of education is undoing even the very small good that the policy of Reservation did. We are witnessing the re-Brahminization of education, this time fitted out in corporate clothes.”
In the whole of her press release, there is not one reference, let alone an explanation, to why privatization of education is wrong and dangerous, or is responsible for “Brahminization.” As though it was something that is self-evident and needs no further explanation, no one questioned her regarding this statement. What she stated may seem obvious, which is why most people believed it right away; but, in fact, privatization and “Brahminization” are in no way concomitant of one another in either theory or practice.
Let us now closely look at the relation between these two ideas. Everyone, especially the common man, seems to have taken it for granted that privatization of education results in a separatist, prejudiced and impractical curriculum in schools and colleges. They have internalized that anything private is adulterated and fraudulent, and held this notion as an axiomatic truth — which it is not.
If privatization of education takes place, i.e., if only private individuals are allowed to own educational institutions, if government neither interferes in nor provides education, there will arise plenty of institutions, and they will decide their own curricula. Good for us, almost all of them will work to get profits; and in order to get profits they must have a promising and practical curriculum, good faculty, and modern infrastructure. And these conditions should be maintained to their best capacity, besides constantly updating themselves in effective teaching techniques in order to make profits every year. Should they neglect any such necessary criteria, they will face ramifications immediately, in the form of diminished student admissions and punctured reputation. Their owners will then have the impetus to rectify the problem, lest they face losses again.
And if there is one educational group that teaches biased, sectarian and unrealistic curriculum, and ostracizes minorities from its institutions (which, Ms Roy stated, is already happening) — people in such a privatized atmosphere will abandon, not encourage, these institutions in solidarity with the minorities, and also for a crucial reason, namely, that unrealistic and biased curriculum cannot educate any one; it can only destroy the minds of those to whom it has been taught.
Abandoned by society, these institutions will face such tremendous losses that the group running them will be forced to learn from its mistake and correct itself. This will be the case whether there is one such group, or a hundred.
Also, as producing top ranks from an institution helps its image in the society very much, its owner (and not the government) gives scholarships, encouraging talented students from the poor quarters of the society. He, with the support of those like him, will start schools that provide private free education. But here — unlike in the present situation where free education is being doled out by the government (and whose standards are as low as can be) — the common man is not taxed to pay for it.
The owner pays from his own pocket as an investment. The quality of this private free school, especially since the owner is “profit-minded,” will be far better than the present-day public schools: He is spending money because he wants talented children to learn, and be an instrument in promoting his institutions. And so he must have these children study under the best teachers to bring out the brilliant ones, while the rest can continue to study on his goodwill.
(You say goodwill does not run free schools? There are currently many NGOs in our society which provide free education. If this is the case in the present curtailing situation where the government has strong influence, think of what freedom these groups will have and the good they will do once the government is off of their backs.)
Not only does education as a private business enterprise reduce the taxes, leading to increased tax revenue, but it also improves the quality of the education markedly, rendering profits only to those who offer the best education, in turn paving way for various advancements, and eventually to the progress of our nation.
There is very little doubt that “Brahminization” and “Saffronization” of education is happening in our institutions. As in the past, it continues to happen through our silent and passive sanction of unrestrained power to the government to dictate what should or should not be taught.
The only way to save young minds, and to let these “Brahminized,” or “Islamized,” or “Christianized” institutions realize their error — that of having deplorable standards and teaching impractical and parochial views — is by letting them suffer losses, because sooner rather than later people will realize their inefficiency and abandon them.
This can be done, not by subsidizing these institutions or by giving them incentives to continue stifling young minds as the government does today, but by making it possible for good institutions to flourish and make profits, i.e., by privatizing the field of education.
Since this last is one of the many prominent and revolutionary theories of Capitalism, we should study, analyze and implement this political system, instead of simply demonizing it, as has been done for centuries.
If it is our complacency and credulousness of political systems that has brought us to the present chaos, a different, more realistic view of education system brought about by scrutiny and overhauling of the same, is what will get us out of this chaos.
For that, we have to be free in the educational realm: for a person to be free to establish institutions which will not be subjected to any governmental coercion or political intervention as regards what is or is not to be taught in these institutions; and for the public to be free to judge for themselves (and not be dictated) the merit and standard of these institutions — i.e., to privatize education: to explicitly remove governmental authority from the field of education.
So far we have seen, silently and with deference, the implementation of supposedly good ideas such as “public education,” denying private institutions complete autonomy, and holding the profit motive of their owners as unethical — and now we have reached the climax: Quality of education in these public schools that, if it is called abysmal, would be an understatement; owners of private institutions being presented as symbols of wickedness and greed, instead of achievement and success; considerable portion of Indian youth thinking all truly great things are free and that they can mooch them off of the achievers in the name of “social responsibility.”
Government, in this respect, acts as a role model for the youth by teaching them that it is permissible, and indeed morally right, to impose their political and religious views on others, as it does on private institutions under the seemingly benevolent but dangerous banner of “public interest.”
It is past time we kept our deference aside, and questioned, and took our right to freedom of expression seriously: to be able to teach in your institutions what you see fit, to whomever that voluntarily sees joining your institution as profitable, and to rise to heights, not with governmental help (subsidies) or political “favors,” but by merit, by providing good education, and thus giving people a chance to judge you according to your achievements.
The prerequisite for all this to happen is: privatized education. The only political system that is able to create and maintain an atmosphere conducive to such a diverse and competing society is: Capitalism.
Privatization of education is the first and the most important step toward a developed India, and it is what we should secure to revive the quality of our education system and to further our nation. Nothing less will do.
Originally published on a WordPress site on October 9, 2018.
