SPECIAL GUEST KEYNOTE SPEECH AT
11TH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF THE
ASSOCIATION OF SOCIOLOGISTS OF EDUCATION OF NIGERIA
(ASEN)
LAGOS STATE UNIVERSITY, FACULTY OF EDUCATION, OCTOBER
11-14, 2017
Prof. Chidi Oguamanam
Theme: Education and
Economic Recovery
Greetings, distinguished
colleagues! I thank the Vice Chancellor, Prof. Fagbohun, for the opportunity to
contribute to the LASU scholarly community at this point. I also thank the
conference organizers, especially the Deputy Vice Chancellor (Academic), Professor
Noah, the President of the Association of Sociologists of Education of Nigeria,
Prof. Uche Azikiwe and the host Dean, Professor C.O. Fasan, for extending to me
the invitation and offering me the privilege to share some keynote thoughts on
the theme of the conference – “Education and Economic Recovery”.
I am by training and profession a lawyer. By
vocation and day-to-day existence, I am an educationist. In the University
system, it is our tradition to retreat to our disciplinary silos as specialist faculties,
colleges or schools, zealously guarding our intellectual borders while trying
to engage in interdisciplinary concert. But we are all bound by a common bond
as education practitioners. Education is the indispensable oil that lubricates
society’s perpetual grind toward progress across cultures and civilizations.
Education happens in informal, formal or more organized contexts. Such contexts
are determined by ideologies, cultures and worldviews. For instance, those who
say that “western education is evil” are not insisting that education is evil.
Therefore, notwithstanding our ideological extremisms, we all agree that
education is indispensable.
As experts in your fields, sub-fields and
specialities, you know (better than I do) that there is uncountable number of
definitional perspectives or definitions of education that also spill into our
understanding of the sociology of education. As a fundamental empowerment
strategy, education is a natural design to curate the individual to realize
their potential as social beings. Education ensures optimal functioning of the
human society and its natural world in a healthy and sustainable fashion. It
forges the intersection of the individual, social institutions and the society
at large as a catalyst for social progress and social cohesion.
In international law, the right to education
is recognized as a human right. The primary objective of human right is to
erase all barriers (race, gender, sex, sexual orientation disability, religion,
ethnic origin, circumstances of birth) in order to ensure that every human
person is able to realize their potential. When individuals are able to fulfil
their potentials, their societies are correspondingly able to function
optimally as evident in, among other things, wealth creation through
technologies, innovations and open-ended entrepreneurial channels that result
in economic growth and social progress.
Not only is education a human right, it has
overlapping interests with other human rights in their shared commitment to rid
the individual and society of barriers to progress and in their common and
ultimate mission to ensure that the individual is optimally aligned with
society for the best outcome for all.
More than any discipline, education is in
constant evolution to identify lessons from social and institutional
experiences, to chart, pre-empt, respond and to position and reposition society
in its evolutionary trajectory. In this regard, education maps the pathway for
wealth creation and wealth management. It has proven to be the sprint in the
foot of economic and human development and the wind in the sail of every
civilization.
Like most human endeavours,
the economic fortunes of countries are like roller coaster rides. Economists
continue to officiate the ebbs and flows of economic fortunes benchmarking them
according to degrees of stress they perceive through their esoteric scales and
crystal balls that regularly confound ordinary people. Most of us are familiar
with such expressions as “economic recession”, “economic depression”, “economic
austerity”, etc. Predicting global or national economic health is not an exact
science. For example, immediately before the 2008 global financial meltdowns,
the world was cruising on a perceived economic boom, propelled by unprecedented
burst of innovation in digital technologies, the so-called “com boom” or
“digital revolution”. Suddenly, from that altitude we crashed, without
deploying the landing gear, into the ditch of so-called “dot.com burble” and
the great financial crisis that followed.
Like most developing counties, Nigeria’s
economy remains vulnerable to forces outside our control and to our fragile and
unpredictable political and institutional cultures. We are forever on the edge
on matters regarding our country’s economic temperament. Recent crash in global
oil price resulted in the near collapse of our economy. Latest stabilizations
in global oil price hint at some form of economic calming, some call it
economic recovery. But the volatility of our economy does not quite warrant the
recent gloating and politics of our so-called economic recovery. You can only
recover what is lost. Since after independence, specifically following the
discovery of oil, Nigeria has never had a stable economy. Rather, as a nation,
we have been flip-plopping our way through our economic life and missed
opportunities on a rhythm of two steps forward three steps backward – a deficit
of progress in which our economic realities and indices are far detached from
our phenomenal population growth.
Our educational system remains under pressure
to bridge the apparent disconnect between our graduates and the demands of our
peculiar economy and labour market. Our recent educational history has
witnessed bold and innovative steps geared toward education for employment or
entrepreneurship-based education albeit in a half-hearted manner.
Behind these initiatives are also creative
curriculum engineering or curriculum redesigning which is a permanent feature
of the sociology of education. As sociologists of education, the current era
where information communication Technologies (ICTs) are the pivot of social,
economic and cultural renaissance, your work as the brainbox of educational
planning has never been more cut out.
Beyond the economic recovery (which the DVC
and ASEN President attest to at micro level) – a narrative which, at a global
or macro level, verges on a sort of mirage notwithstanding the underlying
official rhetoric, we have a generational opportunity to re-engage the
foundations of our education in the pursuit of the incredible opportunities
offered by new technologies which Nigeria’s youths – its greatest human
resource – have rapidly embraced.
But lest I be misunderstood, in the
intersection of education and economic fortunes of a nation, we should not dispense
with the theoretical/philosophical-oriented education as represented by the
humanities or liberal arts, and aspects of the social and primary sciences.
After all, there is no technology without science, and no creativity without
art. These categories are often the first to be despised, degraded, denigrated
and defunded through the smoking fire of economic crisis. But the truth is that
they are the drivers of cultural revolutions and are the vanguards of infinite
human creative potentials that often translate into gold mines for economic and
entrepreneurial possibilities.
For example, as the world transforms into a
post carbon economy with fossil fuel being relegated to a low value produce and
environmental nuisance, Nigeria’s hope for economic survival is increasingly
pointing to the entertainment and art sector as evident in the Nollywood and
our burgeoning creative art industrial complex. In addition to their valued
added, our creative writers, musicians, actors and artists of all shades are
potential catalyst for transformational tourism that can sustainably energize
our economy.
Education holds the balance in the pendulum
between the academics on the one hand, and practical skills in trade and
technologies on the other. Striking that balance is crucial for the optimum
realization of the economic, social and cultural potential of any civilization
and society. That balance is urgently needed within the policy space of a
developing country with a fragile economy such as Nigeria. More than any other discipline,
the sociology of education is better placed to articulate and indulge or drive
that conversation. It is evidently a timely and topical discussion.
Counterintuitively, Nigeria’s greatest
national security threat is not terrorism, neither is it our fractured and
fragile polity. It lies in our failure to invest whole heartedly in quality
education at all levels. For example, with education, not many young men or
women could be convinced to take the part of violence and suicide to prosecute
any cause, whatever it may be. The years of military rule in Nigeria were years
of the locust that mortgaged the future of Nigerian youth through the
relegation of education. If education was prioritized above defence to be the
highest sectoral beneficiary of our post-independence budgets, our polity and
economy would have been stronger. And most of the present existential threats
to Nigeria could not be as potent as they have since become.
Thank you for the opportunity to participate
in this important exchange as you mark the second decade of your journey at
ASEN.
