The great education debate (1977)

From the July 1977 issue of the Socialist Standard

To a socialist the name of that true-blue servant of capitalism, Peregrine Worsthorne, does nothing to inspire respect. However, the reactionary outpourings of such as Worsthorne are often quite revealing of what constitutes the true, if publicly unexpressed, thinking of our — and their — capitalist masters.

In the Times Educational Supplement of May 6th under the headline “Why not cut back when so few get anything from school”, we have laid before us the crude reality of education under capitalism. On Tuesday 3rd May Worsthorne addressed a conference at the Roehampton Institute of Higher Education. The following is a part of what he had to say:

It is extremely important that education be geared to ’the needs of society, but we need to be brutally realistic about what the needs of society are. It will always be a minority who take the decisions and the rest will have to accept them. You may jigger about with the means of choosing the élite as much as you like but now, as never before, society has to face the inescapable necessity for the development of a formidable élite.

As if this were not enough, Worsthorne proceeds to really rub our noses in it:

Industrialization meant that most people needed practical intelligence less than ever, and education aimed at encouraging personal development was of the wrong kind for an overcrowded world.

And later:

Most people are going to have to live in a subordinate role, however we dress it up.

And to crown it all:

It is difficult to admit that the great majority will not have satisfaction at work or in other parts of their lives. Politicians and journalists cannot do much about it. Teachers are asking for trouble if they think they can. To encourage children to believe it is all going to be different when they grow up is wrong and will cause a great deal of unhappiness.

Now, the Roehampton Institute of Higher Education represents only a relatively obscure élite in itself, a factor which may have contributed to the onset of Worsthorne’s attack. However, his honesty on this occasion is indeed refreshing.

He is stating what is true under capitalism. Independence of mind breeds thought and thinkers tend to ask awkward questions — too awkward, that is to say, for those who own the means of production and distribution. Their survival as capitalists depends upon the disciplined and acquiescent wage-labour of everybody else, including what that means in the deliberate restriction of working-class education.

Richard Cooper