Book Review Pages
The Kathmandu Post Review of Books
Vol. 2, No. 9
Issue Coordinator: Shizu Upadhya
Martin Chautari for
CSRD and The Kathmandu Post
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Essay
Reviews
- India: Economic Development and Social Opportunity (Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen)
- Social Life in Nepal: From Tradition to Modernity (Govinda Maskey)
- Learning from Gal Oya: Possibilities for Participatory Development and Post-Newtonian Social Science (Norman Uphoff)
The Right to Basic Primary Education
Bimal Phnuyal
Not only does the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) affirm people's right to free elementary education, the Constitution of Nepal (1990) also declares that the state shall make necessary arrangements to safeguard the rights and interests of children and shall ensure that arrangements for free education be made [Art.26(8)]. Thus, both national and international arenas have unquestionably recognized the State's responsibility for the basic primary education of all children. It is in this context that the right to basic education can be raised meaningfully.
Following its commitment to provide primary education for all by the year 2000, which it made at the World Summit on Children held in New York 1990, the Nepali government, or rather, successive governments, have introduced some new initiatives in this regard. Through the formation of a national-level Education Commission and similar task forces, attempts have been made to enrich the discourse on the issue and adopt policies accordingly. However, consultation processes so far have been restrictive, confined to the involvement of educationalists, primarily, and other high level professionals.
BPEP
BPEP (Basic and Primary Education Project), based on the basic education master plan, has been the major intervention in primary education in recent years. Noteworthy, especially in the context of the donor-driven nature of the Nepali state, is that BPEP was born under the joint midwifery of major development donors including the World Bank, ADB, DANIDA, UNICEF, JICA and UNDP, in addition to the Nepali government. The major objective of BPEP has been to enhance access to basic and primary education, and to bring about improvement in the quality of primary education across the country.
Experiences since the launching of BPEP (1992 to date) generate some key questions for the discourse on basic education as a fundamental right of children. The purpose of this article, however, is not to evaluate the impact of BPEP. Rather, an attempt is made to share some critical observations on the issue of education as a right, within the specific socio-political complexities of Nepali society.
Power and Education
Educational development is a political process. Lack of access to basic education is not a matter of political neutrality; rather, it is a manifestation of the evolution of social power dynamics. Why, for instance, do fewer girls go to school than boys? Why are children from Brahmin, Chhetri and Newar communities more likely to complete their school education and acquire higher education, as compared to children of Magar, Tamang and Dalit groups? Why do the majority of children from high-level bureaucrat families and the business community study at private English medium schools, whilst children from landless or small-land holders are unable to attend "free" government schools?
Not only do lines of class and ethnicity stratification impact on Nepal's education record, so do those of gender and region. To a large extent, these stratifications are overlapping. Those Nepalis denied access to social resources (particularly the poor, women, dalits, the janajati and residents of remote areas) are also deprived of their fundamental rights. They cannot afford to attend school. Most of their time and energy is spent on meeting their daily needs of survival, as the majority are landless or virtually landless, owning no means of production. These people rely upon their meagre labour wages for a livelihood. Besides such economic factors, socio-cultural relationships also perpetuate their marginalization.
In this way, literacy and illiteracy are about politics. The given social stratification in a particular setting determines the fate of most of its people. However, change is possible. Access to literacy and education can contribute to the positive transformation of these stratifications. As a result, the state's responsibility for basic education is all the more critical.
Recent statistics reveal that there have been increases in the number of schools, rates of enrolment and attendance as well as the number of trained teachers. This notwithstanding, the trend points to persistently low enrolment rates among economically poor groups and girl students, and the same is true for children of dalit and janajati communities. Furthermore, net enrolment ratios are much lower than gross enrollment ratios among the latter group. This means that those children who enrol are very likely to repeat classes and, eventually, dropout early.
There are clear links between these matters of power and people's participation in decision-making processes, and the quality of teaching and the learning environment. Nepalis from the poor and marginalized groups participate minimally or not at all in the management of their children's schools. Though they are encouraged to contribute voluntary labour during school-building, they are seldom consulted during strategy-development concerning the quality of their children's education.
In the present political setup, the power to recruit, train, supervise and evaluate school teachers is concentrated in a single bureaucratic authority. As a result, teachers are solely accountable to this administrative body. Maintaining the authority's good humour, not actively encouraging community participation, is the bottom line of Nepal's education system.
Since the restoration of multi-party democracy, an important amount of power has, theoretically, been transferred to the local community: now Nepalis can decide, for instance, to acquire primary education in their mother tongue. Other provisions have been made for people's participation in decision-making processes, but persistent resource shortages continue to hamper effective implementation of these policies.
What next?
Above all, it is essential that people be made aware of basic primary education as a fundamental right. Concerned authorities, various cultural institutions, political and elected bodies, parents and community groups, indeed, the whole of civil society, needs to be mobilized in this endeavour. This awareness is the foundation of the power of poor and marginalized groups.
The role of the media and the maturing NGO sector is crucial too. NGOs have already gained significant experience in running alternative non-formal educational centres in certain pockets of the country. Results so far prove that this approach can contribute meaningfully to methodological innovation, among others. However, since the impact of NGO activities rarely graduates beyond micro-level experimentation, the challenge of the nation is to re-orient the whole system.
As a political-economical issue, the issue of children's education needs to be integrated with the empowerment process of the poor and marginalized overall. In this, effective participatory approaches to adult literacy have a crucial role to play. By means of various education and interaction processes, adults can become capable of analyzing their problems, improve their skills and knowledge, develop their bargaining power and decide on alternative courses of action.
It is also important to institutionalize basic primary education as the State's responsibility. Basic quality education must be made free and available to each and every child. Ongoing privatization of education is further deepening the gap between social groups, and should be challenged urgently. Basic education should not become a commodity that caters only to the needs of the rich and powerful who can afford it. The State needs to ensure that children, irrespective of class, ethnicity and gender, have access to quality basic education.
As the Koboswa Declaration (ACTIONAID 1997) has put forward, the approach of NGOs in the above context should be to enable people to access education rather than provide that education for them. This should be our approach also. For Nepal's education system today, it is not enough to make a quantitative shift. What we require is a permanent change in the situation, more decentralization of authority and power to the people. Only this will lead to positive social transformation.
(B. Phnuyal is working on REFLECT)
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India: Economic Development and Social Opportunity
Authors: Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen
Publisher: Oxford University Press, Delhi 1995
Illuminating Policy Debate
Anupam Bhatia
"Policy debates in India must be taken away from the narrow concentration on issues of liberalisation which tend to spotlight one part leaving the rest of the stage obscured", say Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen. The work under discussion "aims to bring the darker part of the stage more into consideration".
The authors attempt to achieve this through an erudite 200-page effort. The first of the eight chapters, the introduction, quotes from the well-known "tryst with destiny" oration on the eve of independence, which articulated the Nehruvian vision of a free India. Nehru reminded the nation that the task ahead included "the ending of poverty and ignorance and disease and inequality of opportunity".
In following chapters, Dreze and Sen analyze post-independence India's record on the twin fronts of "Economic Development and Social Opportunity". They contend that the development performance of the Indian economy has been moderate at best. The key issue, however, is not this moderate performance in overall economic growth. Rather, it is the extent to which the country is prepared for large-scale participatory growth. While GNP and GDP growth can quite possibly move up rapidly in the coming years, the country remains handicapped economically and socially by its overwhelming illiteracy, backwardness in health care and other crucial deprivations. The "hesitancy of the overall growth rate may well be cured soon enough, but these limitations would still continue to restrain the participatory possibilities of the growth process", the authors say.
The issue of inequality of opportunity remains central throughout the book. Using empirical facts and figures, it creates a persuasive relationship between basic education and the well-being of people. In a society in which very large numbers cannot write or count, the social opportunities offered by market-based economic growth are severely limited. Correcting biases such as inequality in basic education - not just in political rhetoric but in practical ways - calls for a major shift of emphasis in policy making. In this context, say the authors, "the success of development programmes cannot be judged merely in terms of their effects on incomes and outputs, {but} must, at a basic level, focus on the lives that people lead".
Where the book widens its audience beyond India is in its dealing of instruments of liberalisation, which is the current norm in the rest of South Asia. These countries share a common level of endemic deprivation, among them access to land rights, local democracy and gender equality.
While the book is well-written and evocative in its concern for the poor, its text is repetitive in places, making use at times of "over-used" examples. These include Kerala's success in improving literacy and reducing fertility rates, comparison of India's relatively poor performance in light of that of the Asian tigers and reiteration of Uttar Pradesh's ignominious position at the bottom of the development scale among the other states of India.
The authors do not give sufficient consideration to the ethical dimension of growth, which is necessary for it to be participatory. All development is political and is driven by interests other than just altruism. The undistinguished role of the global corporate sector, battles over product and process patents, unequitable terms of trade in GATT and the WTO attempts to legalise biopiracy and Northern discrimination of Southern market access are examples in this respect. While ethics may appear to be a luxury for the poor waiting for their next meal, it must form part of the wider debate on liberalisation if the well-being of India's (and South Asia's) millions is not to deteriorate further still.
Thus, this book is unable to illuminate entirely all "dark" corners of the contemporary debate on poverty reduction. Also, while the book makes a convincing case for investment in education and basic health, it does not lay out a concise vision of how this is to be done against the backdrop of India's current situation. What Dreze and Sen do manage is to reveal some harsh truths on Indian policy failure and abrogation of government responsibility. A major shift in policy making is long overdue if Indian policy makers are to genuinely fight poverty, and reduce their shame.
(A. Bhatia is an Indian professional based in Kathmandu)
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Social Life in Nepal: From Tradition to Modernity
Author: Govinda Maskey
Publisher: Anmole Publications, 1996
In the Name of Modernity
Tim Whyte
Social Life in Nepal: From Tradition to Modernity provides a welcome study of the first quarter of the twentieth century. Maskey argues that the often neglected era marks the most important period of Nepal's modernization. In this regard, the book is a well-researched and useful counterweight to the emphasis that most histories (and indeed popular wisdom) have placed on the opening-up of the post-1951 period. The book traces Nepal's first bout with 'development', under which, lest we forget, Chandra Shumshere introduced the first mechanized transportation system (the Tarai railway and the ariel rope-way to the Valley), a new postal and telephone service and a number of extensive infrastructure projects, focusing especially on canals and bridges.
Maskey focuses on four areas of social reform: slavery and bonded labour, sati, the position of women and education. At least three of these areas potentially have relevance in Nepal's continuing search for development. Although he casts it as a social history, Maskey has given us a detailed history of social legislation. His particular interest is in Chandra Shumshere's reforms and their historical context, and not simply in the social context of the day.
The book raises a series of important and fascinating questions about the relationship between social legislation and society. Let me give as an example his treatment of slavery, the area of Nepali history with which I am most familiar. In his chapter on slavery and bondage, Maskey briefly considers the "Conditions of Slaves". He writes that slavery was a social evil, depriving people of "the dignity of manhood", noting that slaves were often sold as children. He also quotes Francis Hamilton (Buchanan), who came to Nepal in the beginning of the nineteenth century, that all female slaves in the valley were prostitutes. Yet, concludes Maskey, "The slaves were said to be well-fed, well-clothed, kindly treated and contented with their lot. They were more or less domestic servants and in some families the older slaves were shown great consideration." This latter opinion is based, apparently, on the letter of a British Resident in Kathmandu.
Most of Maskey's discussion on slavery (18 out of 21 pages) concerns the history of laws regulating and eventually abolishing slavery. Maskey thus manages to separate the legal and social reality of slavery. The book's interest in slavery is in the government's attempts to undo it. Thus, despite Maskey's early contention that slavery was "the outcome of factors deeply rooted in the economic and social fabric of society" and despite his detailed legislative history, we are left with limited knowledge of the substance and culture of slavery in Nepal. Is, as Maskey suggests, slavery's main legacy to the country its legal non-existence? What constitutes a history of slavery? That Maskey's interest is limited to emancipation - the fall of another backward 'tradition' - is understandable perhaps, given that the focus of his work is the transition to 'modernity'. Unfortunately, the perspective informs nearly everything written on slavery. Social Life in Nepal should encourage us to think about whose history we are writing.
Maskey's administrative history also raises questions about how we use analytical terms such as 'modernity', 'tradition' and 'reform'. The book changes the image of a 'traditional' Nepal opening its borders and 'modernizing' after 1951, yet the story - "From Tradition to Modernity" - remains essentially the same. If Maskey can move the advent of 'modernity' back to the early twentieth century, maybe we can begin to question the meaning of historical change in general. 'Nepal' has been changing since people first settled the Kathmandu Valley, or, if we are to believe an earlier historiography, since a god first drained a lake there. The question perhaps should be what the nature of the changes were and for whom. This is where the idea of a transition to 'modernity' becomes complicated. Terms such as 'traditional' and 'modern' have no meaning in and of themselves: each is a relative term that derives its meaning from its opposition to the other. This is not to say they have no use for history. Clearly, the vision of a transition "from tradition to modernity" has occupied the political and social imagination of Nepal throughout the twentieth century. But, we must be clear on what we are researching: the transition to 'modernity' itself or the creation of and belief in 'modernity'.
Maskey generally avoids such distinctions, but he does broach the latter subject in his discussion of the Rana's motivations for reform. He suggests that Chandra's interest in modernization stemmed not from a social conscience, but from a desire "to immortalize himself as a great reformer in Nepal". The international climate - the rise of Japan and the British colonial government's development projects in India - and his Western education provided the script and costumes for the historical actor to seize the day. Does this sound familiar? It should, for the history of modernity - and Maskey's book - has considerable relevance for the arguments over Nepal's current and seemingly perpetual un-state of development. The irony of history is that the uncritical acceptance of the idea of 'reform' continues Chandra's great play today.
(T. Whyte is a student at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, USA, currently writing a thesis on slavery in the Himalayas.)
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Learning from Gal Oya: Possibilities for Participatory Development and Post-Newtonian Social Science
Author: Norman Uphoff
Publisher: Intermediate Technology Publications, London, 1996
Altruism Stimulated
Rajendra Pradhan
Norman Uphoff's "Learning from Gal Oya" is a bold, stimulating and ambitious book. Reflecting on his decade long experience of the Gal Oya project in Sri Lanka, Uphoff not only draws lessons about participatory development but presents his vision of 'post-Newtonian social science'.
The book is divided into two parts. The first part's description of the Gal Oya project is written in the form of a narrative report of his field visits to Gal Oya. This part reads like a mix between the fieldwork diary and the fieldwork report familiar to anthropologists. Uphoff lucidly lays out what the project attempted to do, what actually happened, what was possible and what was not, and what the key actors (farmers, government officials, project personnel, etc.) did or did not do. The narrative includes not only observations on behaviour but also records people's thoughts.
The Gal Oya irrigation was constructed by the Sri Lankan government in the 1950s. It was the country's biggest irrigation system, covering about 125,000 acres and fed by a large reservoir. By the mid-70s, the system was badly in need of rehabilitation due to poor management and maintenance by the Irrigation Department. Water shortage was severe, especially since the reservoir was usually less than half-full. Frequent conflicts between the farmers over the supply of water led to breakage of structures, poor maintenance and irregular and unequitable distribution of water.
In 1980 the Sri Lankan Government and USAID requested the Agrarian Research and Training Institute (ARTI) and the Rural Development Committee of the Cornell University to help organize water user associations in Gal Oya as a pilot project. Thirty-two local university graduates were trained as institutional organizers (IO) and sent to the pilot area. Their main task was to motivate over 10,000 farmers to form water user associations. Within six weeks of beginning their work, IOs were able to motivate over 90 percent of the farmers to meet frequently in small groups, discuss problems and seek collective solutions. Farmers agreed to clean the canals, head-end farmers began saving water, and the associations introduced water rotation schedules whereby tail-end farmers would receive their fair share, even if this meant reduced water supply to head-end fields. The farmers' altruistic and cooperative behaviour led to social, political and economic changes in the project area.
In the book's second part on 'Explanations', Uphoff presents his analysis of Gal Oya. He attempts to explain why the farmers, considered individualistic, selfish, and contentious so readily became altruistic and cooperative. His explanation is that human beings are both selfish and individualistic as well as altruistic and cooperative, just as they are guided both by material interests and ideas and values too. If a situation is created that changes value orientation, human beings are willing to act collectively (and equitably), keeping each others' welfare in mind. Good IOs (or other external catalytic forces) are able to create such situations, especially by organizing public meetings between local groups. This holds important lessons for students and practitioners of participatory development.
Uphoff next presents a critique of dominant social science assumptions which are based on classical Newtonian science. He outlines his version of a new social science, drawing on theories in diverse disciplines including relativity theory (from quantum physics), chaos theory (biology) and multiple frame of reference from hermeneutics (interpretation of texts). Newtonian social science posits mechanistic, deterministic causation, assumes closed systems and zero-sum alternatives and separates subjective and objective factors in analysis. It also privileges individual over collective, material over ideational and mechanistic over organic models. Post-Newtonian science, with its binocular perspective, does not insist on either/or alternatives but on both/and; and it appreciates contradictions and paradox. It insists on the importance of values, norms and meaning yet does not ignore people's material interests.
While the explanatory power of post-Newtonian social science is no doubt stronger than that of Newtonian social science, it is limited by its exclusion of history and political economy. Uphoff does not ask, much less answer, what historical and political economic conditions set the stage for individualistic, contentious, uncooperative behaviour initially observed in Gal Oya. Uphoff's social science is strangely limited to economics and political science (with scant acknowledgment of sociology). He seems rather ignorant of developments in anthropology (and sociology more broadly) which has addressed some of the theories he discusses.
It also seems odd that though Uphoff describes Gal Oya, he does not mention traditional irrigation management in Sri Lanka. He briefly discusses the Pithuwa Irrigation System (Government constructed but later managed by the farmers), but fails to mention other farmer-managed irrigation systems, some of which have been studied by Cornell students, and which have been as 'successful' as Gal Oya. And this without the help of social scientists, institutional organizers or the Irrigation Department. We are led to wonder what do we learn about participatory development from Gal Oya, set against the ignored traditional systems of farmer-managed irrigation. Does this indicate scope for "post" post-Newtonian social science?
(Anthropologist R Pradhan is affiliated with FREEDEAL)
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