Position Paper

750 EDUCATION AS A POLITICAL I N S T I T U T I O N

seeing so many black-clothed people about, said to his driver, —

' W h a t is it — a wedding?' ' N o , zurr, they say 't is for the rec-

tor, like, h e ' v e a just been acquitted for larceny.'

On the Tuesday following, the rec- down manna.

tor's ravaged face and red-gray hair appeared in Mrs. Gloyn's doorway, and his voice, creaking like a saw, said, —

' C a n you let me have a pound of butter? P a y you soon.'

What else could he do? N o t even to God's elect does the sky always send

EDUCATION AS A POLITICAL INSTITUTION

BY BERTRAND RUSSELL

N o political theory is adequate un- less it is applicable to children as well as to men and women. Theorists are mostly childless, or, if they have chil- dren, they are carefully screened from the disturbances which would be caus- ed by youthful turmoil. Some of them have written books on education, but without, as a rule, having any actual children present to their minds while they wrote. Those educational theo- rists who have had a knowledge of chil- dren, such as the inventors of kinder- garten and the Montessori system, have not always had enough realization of the ultimate goal of education to be able to deal successfully with advanced instruction. I have not the knowledge either of children or of education which would enable me to supply whatever defects there may be in the writings of others. B u t some questions concerning education as a political institution are involved in any hope of social recon- struction, and are not usually consid- ered by writers on educational theory. These questions only I wish to discuss.

The two principles of justice and lib- erty, which cover a very great deal of the social reconstruction required, will not give much guidance as regards edu- cation. Tolstoi tried to conduct a vil- lage school without infringing liberty; but when anybody except Tolstoi was teaching, the children all talked to each other, and when he himself was teach- ing, he secured order only by untheoret- ically boxing their ears in a fit of tem- per. I t is clear t h a t a literal adherence to the principle of liberty is quite im- possible if the children are to be taught anything, except in the case of unusu- ally intelligent children who are kept isolated from more normal companions. This is one reason for the great respon- sibility which rests upon teachers: the children must, unavoidably, be more or less a t the mercy of their elders, and cannot make themselves the guardians of their own interests. Authority in education is to some extent unavoid- able, and those who educate have to find a way of exercising authority in accordance with the spirit of liberty.

Where authority is unavoidable, what is needed is reverence. A man who

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is to educate really well, who is to bring out of the young all t h a t it is possible to bring out, who is to make them grow and develop into their full stature, must be filled through and through with the spirit of reverence. I t is reverence t h a t is lacking in those who advocate ma- chine-made, cast-iron systems: militar- ism, capitalism, Fabian scientific organ- ization, and all the other prisons into which reformers and reactionaries try to force the hxunan spirit. I n educa- tion, with its codes of rules emanating from a government ofl[ice, with its large classes and fixed curriculimi and over- worked teachers, with its determination to produce a dead level of glib medioc- rity, the lack of reverence for the child is all b u t universal. Reverence requires imagination and vital warmth; it re- quires most imagination in respect of those who have least actual achieve- ment or power. The child is weak and superficially foolish; the teacher is strong, and in an everyday sense wiser than the child. The teacher without reverence, or the bureaucrat without reverence, easily despises the child for these outward inferiorities. He thinks it his duty to ' m o u l d ' the child; in imagination he is the potter with the clay. And so he gives to the child some unnatural shape which hardens with age, producing strains and spiritual dis- satisfactions, out of which grow cruelty and envy and the belief t h a t others must be compelled to undergo the same distortions.

T h e man who has reverence will not think it his duty to ' m o u l d ' the young. H e feels in all t h a t lives, but especially in human beings, and most of all in children, something sacred, indefinable, unlimited, something individual and strangely precious, the growing prin- ciple of life, an embodied fragment of the diunb striving of the world. H e feels an unaccountable humility in the presence of a child — a humility not

easily defensible on any rational ground, and yet somehow nearer t o wisdom than the easy self-confidence of many parents and teachers. H e feels the out- ward helplessness of the child, the a p - peal of dependence, the responsibility of a trust. His imagination shows him what the child may become, for good or evil; how its impulses may be devel- oped or thwarted, how its hopes must be dimmed and the life in it grow less living, how its trust will be bruised and its quick desires replaced by brooding will. All this gives him a longing to help the child in its own battle, to strengthen it and equip it, not for some outside end proposed by the state or by any other impersonal authority, but for the ends which the child's own spirit is obscurely seeking. The man who feels this can wield the authority of an educator without infringing the prin- ciple of liberty.

I t is not in a spirit of reverence t h a t education is conducted by states and churches and the great institutions t h a t are subservient to them. What is con- sidered in education is hardly ever the boy or girl, the young man or young woman, but almost always, in some form, the maintenance of the existing order. When the individual is consid- ered, it is with a view to worldly suc- cess — making money, or achieving a good position. To be ordinary, and to acquire the art of getting on, is the idea which is set before the youthful mind, except by a few rare teachers who have enough energy of belief to break through the system within which they are expected to work. Almost all edu- cation has a political motive: it aims a t strengthening some group, national or religious or even social, in the competi- tion with other groups. I t is this mo- tive, in the main, which determines the subjects taught, the knowledge which is off'ered, and the knowledge which is withheld. I t is this motive also which

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752 EDUCATION AS A POLITICAL I N S T I T U T I O N

determines the mental habits t h a t the pupils are expected to acquire. Hardly anything is done to foster the inward growth of mind and spirit; in fact, those who have had most education are very often atrophied in their mental and spiritual life, devoid of impulse, and possessing only certain mechanical a p - titudes which take the place of living thought.

II

Some of the things which education achieves a t present must continue to be achieved by education in any civil- ized country. All children must con- tinue to be taught how to read and write, and some must continue to ac- quire the knowledge needed for such professions as medicine and law and en- gineering. Except in such matters as history and religion, the actual instruc- tion is only inadequate, not positively harmful. T h e instruction might be giv- en in a more liberal spirit, with more a t t e m p t to show its ultimate uses; and of course much of it is traditional or dead. B u t in the main it is necessary, and would have to form a part of any educational system.

I t is in history and religion and other controversial subjects t h a t the actual instruction is positively harmful. These subjects touch the interests by which schools are maintained; and the inter- ests maintain the schools in order t h a t certain views on these subjects may be taught. History, in every country, is so taught as to magnify t h a t country: children learn to believe t h a t their own country has been always in the right and almost always victorious, t h a t it has produced almost all the great men, and t h a t it is in all respects superior to all other countries. Since these beliefs are flattering, they are easily absorbed, and hardly ever dislodged from instinct by later knowledge.

To take a simple and almost trivial

example: the facts about the battle of Waterloo are known in great detail and with minute accuracy; but the facts as taught in elementary schools will be widely different in England, France, and Germany. T h e ordinary English boy imagines t h a t the Prussians played hardly any part; the ordinary Ger- man boy imagines t h a t Wellington was practically defeated when the day was retrieved by Blucher's gallantry. If the facts were taught accurately in both countries, national pride would not be fostered to the same extent, neither na- tion would feel so certain of victory in the event of war, and the willingness to fight would be diminished. I t is this result which has to be prevented. Every state wishes to foster national pride, and is conscious t h a t this cannot be done by unbiased history. T h e de- fenseless children are taught by distor- tions and suppressions and suggestions. T h e false ideas as to the history of the world which are taught in the various countries are of a kind which fosters strife and serves to keep alive a bigoted nationalism. If good relations between states were desired, one of the first steps ought to be to submit all teaching of history to an international commis- sion, which should produce neutral textbooks free from the patriotic bias which is now demanded everywhere.

Exactly the same thing applies to religion. Elementary schools are prac- tically always in the hands, either of some religious body, or of a state which has a definite attitude toward religion. A religious body exists through the fact t h a t its members all have certain defin- ite beliefs on subjects as to which the t r u t h is not ascertainable. Schools con- ducted by religious bodies have to pre- vent the young, who are often inquir- ing by nature, from discovering t h a t these definite beliefs are opposed by other equally definite beliefs which are no more unreasonable, and t h a t many

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of the men best qualified to judge think t h a t there is no good evidence in favor of any definite belief. When the state is militantly secular, as in France, state schools become as dogmatic as those that are in the hands of the churches; I understand t h a t the word ' G o d ' must not be mentioned in a French elemen- tary school. When the state is neu- tral, as in America, all religious discus- sion has to be excluded, and the Bible must be read without comment, lest the comment should favor one sect ra- ther than another. The result in all these cases is the same: free inquiry is checked, and on the most important matter in the world the child is met with dogma or with stony silence.

I t is not only in elementary educa- tion t h a t these evils exist. I n more advanced education they take subtler forms, and there is more attempt to conceal them, but they are still present. Eto n and Oxford set a certain stamp upon a man's mind, just as a Jesuit college does. I t can hardly be said t h a t Eton and Oxford have a conscious pur- pose, but they have a purpose which is none the less strong and eff"ective for not being formulated. I n almost all who have been through them, they produce a worship of 'good form,' which is as destructive to life and thought as the mediaeval Church. ' Good form' is quite compatible with superficial openmind- edness, with readiness to hear all sides, with a certain urbanity toward oppo- nents. But it is not compatible with fundamental openmindedness, or with any inward readiness to give weight to the other side. I t s essence is the as- sumption tha t what is most important is a certain kind of behavior: a be- havior which minimizes friction be- tween equals, and delicately impresses inferiors with a conviction of their own crudity. As a political weapon for pre- serving the privileges of the rich in a snobbish democracy, it is unsurpassa- VOL. 117-NO. e

ble. As a means of producing an agree- able social milieu for those who have money with no strong beliefs or unus- ual desires, it has some merit. I n every other respect, it is abominable.

The evils of 'good form' arise from two sources: its perfect assurance of its own Tightness, and its belief that cor- rect manners are more to be desired than intellect or artistic creation or vi- tal energy, or any of the other sources of progress in the world. Perfect assur- ance, by itself, is enough to destroy all mental progress in those who have it. And when it is combined with contempt for the angularities and awkwardnesses t h a t are almost invariably combined with great mental power, it becomes a source of destruction to all who come in contact with it. 'Good form' is it- self dead, static, incapable of growth; and by its attitude to those who are without it, it spreads its own death to many who might otherwise have life. The harm which it has done to well- to-do Englishmen, and to men whose abilities have led the well-to-do to no- tice them, is incalculable.

The prevention of free inquiry is un- avoidable so long as the purpose of edu- cation is to produce belief rather than thought, to compel the young to hold positive opinions on doubtful matters rather than to let them see the doubt- fulness and be encouraged to inde- pendence of mind. Education ought to foster the wish for truth, not the con- viction t h a t some particular creed is ' the t r u t h. But it is creeds t h a t hold men together in fighting organizations: churches, states, political parties. I t is intensity of belief in a creed t h a t pro- duces efficiency in fighting: victory comes to those who feel the strong- est certainty about matters on which doubt is the only rational attitude. To produce this intensity of belief and this efficiency in fighting, the child's nature is warped, its free outlook is

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cramped, inhibitions are cultivated in order to check the growth of new ideas. I n those whose minds are not very ac- tive, the result is the omnipotence of prejudice; while those whose thought cannot be wholly killed become cyni- cal, intellectually hopeless, destruc- tively critical, able to make all t h a t is living seem foolish, unable t o supply themselves the creative impulses which they destroy in others.

m Certain mental habits are commonly

instilled by those who are engaged in educating: obedience and discipline, ruthlessness in the struggle for world- ly success, contempt toward opposing groups, and an unquestioning credu- lity, a passive acceptance of the teach- er's wisdom. All these habits are against life. Instead of obedience and discipline, we ought to aim a t preserv- ing independence and impulse. In - stead of ruthlessness, education ought to aim a t producing justice in thought. Instead of contempt, it ought to instill reverence, the attemp t a t understand- i n g — n o t necessarily acquiescence, but only such opposition as is combined with imaginative apprehension and a clear comprehension of the grounds for opposition. Instead of credulity, the object should be to stimulate construc- tive doubt, the love of mental adven- ture, the sense of worlds to conquer by enterprise and boldness in thought. Contentment with the status quo, sub- ordination of the individual pupil t o political aims, indifference to the things of the mind, are the immediate causes of these evils; but beneath these causes there is one more fundamental, the fact t h a t education is treated as a means of acquiring power over the pu- pil, not as a means of fostering his own growth. I t Is in this that lack of rever- ence shows itself; and it is only by more

reverence t h a t a fundamental reform can be effected.

Obedience and discipline are sup- posed to be indispensable if order is to be kept in a class, and if any instruction is to be given. To some extent, this is true; but the extent is much less than it is thought to be by those who regard obedience and discipline as in them- selves desirable. Obedience, the yield- ing of one's will to outside direction, is the counterpart of authority, which consists in directing the will of others. Both may be necessary in certain cases. Refractory children, lunatics, and criminals may require authority, and may need to be forced to obey. But in so far as this is necessary, it is a mis- fortune : what is to be desired is the free choice of ends with which it is not nec- essary to interfere. And educational reformers have shown t h a t this is far more possible than our fathers would ever have believed.

What makes obedience seem neces- sary in schools is the large classes and overworked teachers demanded by a false economy. Those who have no ex- perience of teaching are incapable of imagining the expense of spirit entailed by any really living instruction. They think t h a t teachers can reasonably be expected to work as many hours as bank clerks. Th e result is intense fa- tigue, irritable nerves, an absolute ne- cessity of performing the day's task mechanically. And the task cannot be performed mechanically except by ex- acting obedience.

If we took education seriously, if we thought it as important to keep alive the minds of children as to secure vic- tory in war, we should conduct educa- tion quite differently: we should make sure of achieving the end, even if the expense were a hundredfold greater than it is. To many men and women a small amount of teaching is a delight, and can be done with a fresh zest and

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life which keeps most pupils interested without any need of discipline. T h e few who do not become interested might be separated from the rest, and given a different kind of instruction. A teacher ought to have only as much teaching as can be done, on most days, with actual pleasure in the work, and with an awareness of the pupil's mental needs. The result would be a relation of friendliness instead of hostility be- tween teacher and pupil, a realization on the part of most pupils t h a t educa- tion serves to develop their own lives and is not merely an outside imposi- tion, interfering with play and demand- ing many hours of sitting still. All t h a t is necessary to this end is a greater ex- penditure of money, to secure teachers with more leisure and with a natural love of teaching.

Discipline, as it exists in schools, is very largely an evil. There is a kind of discipline which is necessary to almost all achievement, and which is perhaps not sufficiently valued by those who re- act against the purely external disci- pline of traditional methods. The de- sirable kind of discipline is the kind which comes from within, which con- sists in the power of pursuing a distant object steadily, foregoing and suffering many things on the way. This involves the subordination of impulse to will, the power of directing action by large creative desires even a t moments when they are not vividly alive. Without this, no serious ambition, good or bad, can be realized, no consistent purpose can dominate. This kind of discipline is very necessary. B u t this kind can result only from strong desires for ends not immediately attainable, and can be produced only by education if educa- tion fosters such desires, which it sel- dom does a t present. This kind of dis- cipline springs from within, from one's own will, not from outside authority. I t is not this kind which is sought in

schools, and it is not this kind which seems to me an evil.

Ruthlessness in the economic strug- gle will almost unavoidably be taught in schools while the economic structure of society remains unchanged. This must be particularly the case in the middle-class schools, which depend for their numbers upon the good opinion of parents, and secure that good opin- ion by advertising the success of their pupils. This is one of many ways in which the competitive organization of the state is harmful. Spontaneous and disinterested desire for knowledge is not at all uncommon in the young, and is easily aroused in many in whom it remains latent. But it is ruthlessly checked by teachers who think only of examinations, diplomas, and degrees. For the abler boys, there is no time for thought, no time for the indulgence of intellectual taste, from the moment of first going to school until the moment of leaving the university. From first to last it is simply one long drudgery of examination tips and textbook facts. The most intelligent, at the end, are disgusted with learning, longing only to forget it and to escape into a life of action. Yet there, as before, the eco- nomic machine holds them prisoners, and all their spontaneous desires are bruised and thwarted.

T h e examination system, and the fact t h a t instruction is treated entirely as training for a livelihood, leads the young to regard knowledge from a pure- ly utilitarian point of view, as the road to money, not as the gateway to wis- dom. This would not matter so much if it afi'ected only those who have no genuine intellectual interests. But un- fortunately it affects most those whose intellectual interests are strongest, since it is upon them t h a t the pressure of examinations falls with most sever- ity. To them most, but to all in some degree, education appears as a means

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of acquiring superiority over others; it is infected through and through with ruthlessness and glorification of social inequality. Any free disinterested con- sideration shows t h a t , whatever in- equalities might remain in a Utopia, the actual inequalities are almost all ccwitrary to justice. B u t our education- al system will conceal this from all ex- cept the failures, since those who suc- ceed are on the way to profit by the inequalities, with every encouragement from the men who have directed their education.

IV

Passive acceptance of the teacher's wisdom is easy to most boys and girls. I t involves no effort of independent thought, it seems rational because the teacher knows more than his pupils, and it is the way to win the favor of the teacher unless he is a very exceptional man. Yet the habit of passive accep- tance is a disastrous one in later life. I t causes men to seek a leader, and to ac- cept as a leader whoever is established in t h a t position. I t makes the power of churches, governments, party caucuses, and all the other organizations by which plain men are misled into sup- porting old systems which are harmful to the nation and to themselves. I t is possible t h a t there would not be much independence of thought, even if edu- cation did everything to encourage it; but there would certainly be more than there is a t present. If the object were to make pupils think, rather than to make them accept certain conclusions, education would be conducted quite differently: there would be less rapidity of instruction, more discussion, more occasions when pupils were encouraged to express themselves, more a t t e m p t to make education concern itself with matters in which the pupils felt some interest.

Above all, there would be an en-

deavor to rouse and stimulate the love of mental adventure. T he world in which we live is various and astonish- ing: some of the things which seem plainest grow more and more difficult the more they are considered; other things, which might have been thought forever undiscoverable, have been laid bare by the genius and industry of the men of science. The power of thought, the vast regions which it can master, the much more vast regions which it can only dimly suggest to imagination, give to those whose minds have trav- eled beyond the daily round an amaz- ing richness of material, an escape from the triviality and wearisomeness of familiar routine, by which the whole of life is filled with interest, and the prison walls of the commonplace are broken down. The same love of adventure which takes men to the South Pole, the same passion for a conclusive trial of strength which makes some men wel- come war, can find in creative thought an outlet which is not wasteful or cruel, but full of profit for the whole human race, increasing the dignity of man, in- carnating in life some of t h a t shining splendor which the human spirit is bringing down out of the unknown. T o give this joy, in a greater or less meas- ure, to all who are capable of it, is the supreme end for which the education of the mind is to be valued.

I t will be said t h a t the joy of mental adventure must be rare, t h a t there are few who can appreciate it, and t h a t or- dinary education can take no account of so aristocratic a good. I do not be- lieve this. T h e joy of mental adven- ture is far commoner in the young than in grown men and women. Among children it is very common, and grows naturally out of the period of make- believe and fancy. I t is rare in later life because everything is done to kill it during education. Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth — more

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than ruin, more even than death. Thought is subversive and revolution- ary, destructive and terrible; thought is merciless to privilege^ established institutions, and comfortable habits; thought is anarchic and lawless, indif- ferent to authority, careless of the well- tried wisdom of the ages. Thought, real thought, looks into the pit of Hell and is not afraid. I t sees man, a feeble speck, surrounded by unfathomable depths of silence; yet it bears itself proudly, as immoved as if it were lord of the universe. Thought is great and swift and free, the light of the world, and the chief glory of man.

B u t if thought is to become the pos- session of many, not the privilege of the few, we must have done with fear. I t is fear t h a t holds men back: fear lest their cherished beliefs should prove delu- sions, fear lest the institutions by which they live should prove harmful, fear lest they themselves should prove less worthy of respect than they have sup- posed themselves to be. Should the working man think freely about prop- erty? Then what will become of us, the rich? Should young men and young women think freely about sex? Then what will become of morality? Should soldiers think freely about war? Then what will become of military discipline ? Away with thought! Back into the shades of prejudice, lest property, morals, and war should be endangered! Better t h a t men should be stupid, slothful, and oppressive than t h a t their

thoughts should be free. For if their thoughts were free, they might not think as we do. And a t all costs this disaster must be averted. So the oppo- nents of thought argue in the uncon- scious depths of their souls. And so they act in their churches, their schools, and their universities.

No institution inspired by fear can further life. Hope, not fear, is the crea- tive principle in human affairs. All t h a t has made man great has sprung from the attempt to secure what is good, not from the struggle to avert what was thought evil. I t is because modern edu- cation is so seldom inspired by a great hope t h a t it so seldom achieves a great result. The wish to preserve the past, rather than the hope of creating the fu- ture, dominates the minds of those who control the teaching of the young. Edu- cation should not aim a t a dead aware- ness of static facts, but a t an activity directed toward the world t h a t our ef- forts are to create. I t should be inspir- ed, not by a regretful hankering after the extinct beauties of Greece and the Renaissance, but by a shining vision of the society t h a t is to be, of the triumph t h a t thought will achieve in the time to come, and of the ever-widening hori- zon of man's survey over the universe. Those who are taught in this spirit will be filled with life and hope and joy, able to bear their part in bringing to man- kind a future less sombre than the past, with faith in the glory t h a t human effort can create.

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