NN40, May 2008
Education for Sustainable Development? Or The Sustainability of Education Investment? A Special Issue
Sustainability of economies and of education systems
By Roy Carr-Hill, University of York and Institute of Education, University of London
Email: roycarrhill@yahoo.comI. Current Problems
Growth of output and consumption whilst maintaining (nearly) full employment remains the major stated target of government policy everywhere in all rich countries. Yet, even by traditional criteria, the pattern of growth of the last 25 years has been a failure. It has been less than in the previous 25 years; it has been more sporadic, and at various times and places negative; it has failed to generate full employment; and it has led to increased poverty and inequality, within and among countries, and especially between North and South.
In addition, the traditional view of growth as desirable has been increasingly questioned especially on environmental grounds. The unsustainable use of resources and environmental damage may mean that the uncounted costs of growth outweigh any benefits. Moreover, the benefits are questionable given the failure of the ?trickle down? approach from the rich to the poor.
Essentially the main aim of policy should refocus on the extent to which different forms of activity actually generate benefits in terms of human welfare. There is no problem, in principle, in equating welfare with what citizens want for themselves and for their community, the problem is the belief that these preferences can be adequately expressed in ?free? markets (or in parliamentary elections). Individually and collectively, we need to be able to take a broader (and more long term) view than those mechanisms permit. Whilst this argument is applicable to both poor and rich countries, the problem arises among the rich rather than the poor, so that this note is concerned with economies in the over-serviced societies of the North rather than the South.
Many will share some or all of this critique of the current mess: environmental damage, alienating and precarious employment and obsessive over-consumption. But it is easy to criticise, and exhortations to somehow ?do it differently? are unlikely to be effective. In order to respond adequately to the interrelated problems of consumption, employment and the environment, the whole framework through which we evaluate progress has to be changed from a system dominated by monetary aggregates such as GNP to focus on welfare and equity.
1.1 The Failure of Growth Policies
1.1.1. The Environmental Problems
The concerns most in the public eye have varied, from dependence on non renewable fossil fuels for energy in the 1970s to climate change, bio-diversity and other "global" problems in the 1990s. But, whatever the specific concern, the perceived crisis has become more serious.
One sign of this is the development of an "establishment environmentalism" from 1987 (the Brundtland report) onwards, which seeks to preserve growth and profits while minimising environmental damage, or offloading it on those least able to complain and whose willingness to pay is least. Proposed technological solutions mitigate the immediate problem but do not alter the fundamental problem of depreciation of available resources for future generations.
1.1.2. Employment and Work
Whilst ecological costs are probably large they are not so large and so certain that we can ignore other costs and benefits of the output-driven agenda. Much of current production is ?useless? in terms of contributing to human welfare and, inasmuch as it is labour directed by someone else, inherently dissatisfying and often frustrating. Also paid employment is not, in general, an appropriate way to carry out many socially necessary functions (e.g. caring).
It needs to be remembered that the post World War II emphasis on full employment ? with unemployment as something to be avoided - was a new invention. Indeed, in the first half of the century, at least until the 1930s (with its well-remembered recession), the emphasis was more on how new inventions and technologies would allow us to develop the leisured utopia. At the same time, for many theorists, work has been seen as alienating for a very long time. Now, not only do many people fear unemployment, but their current jobs may generate stress and sometimes may ruin their lives. Understanding how the emphasis has now come to be on ?full employment? (in inverted commas because it is never actually achieved) requires acrobatic logic of ?Simpsonesque? proportions.
1.1.3 Consumption and Welfare
For mainstream economists, consumers express their preferences by choosing freely what to buy. Presumably therefore ? on that view - what they buy contributes to their welfare and observed market behaviour demonstrates that everyone prefers greater consumption, so that their welfare improves as a result. It is recognised that there are market failures ? including various subsidies and taxation ? but they are seen as rare and exceptional. However, there are serious grounds for arguing that increased consumption is, of itself, generating less consumer benefit or welfare. In particular, there are many types of goods and services where there can only ever be limited consumer benefit, however much is spent (these are called positional goods): an obvious example is houses in sought-after locations. There is much evidence that increased consumption does not improve welfare: from opinion surveys, from historical and cross-cultural studies, and from studies of how markets fail to reflect preference adequately.
1.1.4 ?Joined Up? Thinking
Of course, these kinds of issue have been raised by many authors (e.g. Dauncey 1983; Gorz 1994; Hirsch 1977; Sachs 1992); but our particular approach is to link the three problems of environmental damage, employment and over-consumption. That is the basis for the argument here. If ecological risks are negligible, perhaps we should continue on the present path, given it is politically easier. If (paid) work is so good for us, we should probably just look for more labour-intensive patterns of production . If ever greater consumption is essential to our well-being, then the ecological and employment costs may well be worth suffering, or at least we should focus our efforts on mitigating those costs.
This is a kind of ?cost-benefit analysis? of alternative development paths: the benefits are what currently counts as welfare; and the costs are ecological damage and unpleasant (largely employed) human labour. But not, of course, the official kind of Cost-Benefit Analysis with its (often imputed) monetary valuations, spurious precision and rule of thumb decision-making by technocrats, replacing democratic control. The whole framework of thinking about policy in terms of output growth is misguided; policies and trends need to be assessed according to their contribution to welfare measured in human terms.
1.1.5 Inequalities at Home and Abroad
Not only are these three problems inter-linked, their impact on the rich and poor in society tends to be cumulative. Those who suffer most pollution tend also to have the worst and/or insecure jobs and can barely meet their basic needs. And the sporadic economic growth that we have experienced has not ?trickled down? from the rich to the poor: instead, further liberalisation is generating greater income inequality with the poor finding themselves obliged to work as personal servants for the rich, travelling further in degraded public transport and having even less time for life outside work.
Moreover, a global approach to ecological problems is necessary if we are to understand and appreciate the limits that these place on expansion of economic activity. The fact that various ecological ills ? for example deforestation or soil erosion - are experienced most often in poor countries, or at least the consequences are most serious there, is often blamed on the activities of people in those countries. In a further twist, since some of these ills may also have consequences for the rich countries this can be used to justify dictating policy to the poor countries concerned. Never mind that the real ecological disaster zones are the rich countries, nor that most of the damage stems from satisfying rich country customers.
This is also rather obvious and well documented (see for example Sachs 1993). Along with many others, we therefore reject the globalisation of ecological issues which consists in giving the rich the right to decide how the poor are to "solve" ecological problems. The solutions are addressed to the rich countries that are responsible for the problems in the first place. In other words we need to "think global, act local", in contrast with establishment environmentalists, whose motto seems to be exactly the opposite.
1.2 How Do We Move Forward
1.2.1 Will Current Approaches Work?
A variety of conventional possible solutions have been tried, which presume (usually implicitly rather than explicitly) ever-increasing consumption. Despite the emphasis on ?joined-up government?, connections and contradictions are often ignored: a spectacular example is the UK government?s strategy for sustainable development that both promotes continued output growth and argues for reduction in environmental damage.
The core problem is the ever-increasing consumption and output-oriented growth itself. Policies should be evaluated in terms of their contribution to welfare; how does production contributes to quality of life, without damaging the environment, paying specific attention to those currently at the ?bottom of the heap?. This does not mean fiscal tools (e.g. interest rates and money supply) for managing growth; it means a different path of development.
Also, unlike many proposals by environmentalists, this does not imply sacrifices to be made in the name of sustainability. On the contrary, the current ecological crisis is an opportunity to rethink what the costs and benefits of consumerism really are, and arguing that the costs far outweigh the benefits. There have been many movements that have rejected consumerism. The problem is that, often, the particular focus of those groups has been turned into new market opportunities. A new framework is needed to assess policy and to promote a shift from the current situation where individual employment is detrimental to individual welfare ?compensated? by over-consumption, and where both relative income and consumption have negative impacts through environmental damage on collective well-being; to a collective, eco-friendly and relaxed society where individual employment has neutral impact on welfare and individual consumption contributes to individual welfare, and where income equality and relationships together with neutral environmental impact contribute to collective well-being.
1.2.2 Back to Basics: Defining Welfare
The problem is what is meant by welfare. Welfare is inherently multi-dimensional and that - apart from the elimination of absolute poverty in terms of basic education, food, unnecessary risks to health, shelter and water, both in our countries and in those we have exploited for so long - the diversity of people?s circumstances, must be respected. Beyond those absolute minima, therefore, people have the right to decide for themselves what their welfare means, but we do not believe that either the market or the ballot box allows them to do that adequately. The former only allows for a very crude one-dimensional (monetary) expression of relative preference and is inequitable (because of income inequality), whilst the latter is an alienating form of participation but also provides hardly any choice. At the same time, consumer tastes are not as idiosyncratic as economists often imply; there is a core of social concerns around which, surveys suggest, there is widespread agreement.
The implications of adopting such a welfare framework for current policies rather than privileging output orientation in a number of sectors are illustrated in our book (Carr-Hill and Lintott, 2002); they are substantial. In particular, a set of reductions in consumption of goods and services can be identified which (1) make little or no contribution to welfare and (2) whose production is labour intensive or (3) environmentally damaging. This list can be used to make some preliminary assessment of the impact of reducing consumption (without reducing welfare) upon current damaging levels of environmental emissions and jobs using the Environmental Input Output tables and the Annual Employment Survey. The overall conclusion was that there could be a fourfold cut in consumption and production with no reduction in useful output and therefore individual and collective welfare; and with considerably reduced environmental impact which would probably be sustainable.
2. Implications for Education Systems
Education has a large positional element, where it neither ?educates for life? nor trains for a specific job, but acts merely as a system of selection for jobs. It also has a large ideological component - including inculcating a work-and-consume ethic ? which mainly makes it part of the ?repair and maintenance? of the system. Some early education has a child minding role, so that less would be required (from the formal economy) if adults - especially men, most of whom have managed to avoid the bulk of child care - had more (non-employed) time. Some other (currently formal) education might be better done informally (Illich, 1973).
There is a steady inflation of qualifications. Current policies and a variety of other pressures (such as the positional pressures associated with status discussed above) encourage that trend and mean that further qualifications - however irrelevant to living a satisfying life or indeed to performing the job for which they are sought ? are in ever greater demand.
We do not envisage substantial cuts in primary or in most of secondary education, because they do perform important socialising functions. However there are many reasons to change what socialisation is done and how. There is a strong case to be made for altering the nature of learning, making it far less focused than it currently is on examinations. Less pressurised teaching for those examinations would reduce the amount of ?cramming? and the pressure on teachers including all the artificial paraphernalia of punitive inspection and formalised quality assurance, and allow time and space for more enjoyable learning. Indeed, at primary level, where the final welfare outcomes are capacity to communicate (through language and speech) and socialisation, the focus should be more on enjoyment than on learning (Carr-Hill, 1984)! At secondary level, some of the socialisation is more oriented towards disciplining for the job market than for how people can live fulfilling and tolerant lives in company with others, and so can be eliminated.
At a tertiary level, one would want to move as quickly as possible to learning for its own sake, rather just than for qualifications, although exceptions for training for professional and technical skills would be made, and these may still require some form of examinations. On the whole, however, we believe that much of current resources expended on the tertiary system are dispensable; and, in the overall analysis, we suggested a cut of 50% of resources in education, i.e. a less radical cut than in overall consumption.
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We realise that these are Swiftian / utopian proposals; and, in the book, we make a number of practical suggestions of what can be done now along the lines of ?Consumers (Students) of the World Relax; you have nothing to lose but your Retail Therapy (Qualification) Chains?.
References
Carr-Hill, R.A. (1984) If I were an Anarchist Dictator Libertarian Education
Carr-Hill, R.A. and Lintott J. (2002) Consumption, Jobs and the Environment, Palgrave, Macmillan
Dauncey, G., 1983. Nice Work if You Can Get It. Cambridge: National Extension College.
Douglas, M. and Isherwood, B., 1979. The World of Goods. London: Allen Lane.
Gorz, A., 1994. Capitalism, Socialism, Ecology (trans. Chris Turner). London/New York: Verso.
Hirsch, F., 1977. Social Limits to Growth. London: Routledge.
Illich, I., 1973. Tools for Conviviality. New York: Harper and Row.
Sachs, W., 1992 (orig. 1984). For Love of the Automobile. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Sachs, W. (ed.), 1993. Global Ecology. London: Zed Books.
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