[Reallyopenuniannounce] Fwd: The human significance of the cuts

Sat Nov 13 15:50:31 UTC 2010

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Carlos Frade <C.Frade at salford.ac.uk>
Date: 13 November 2010 11:46
Subject: The human significance of the cuts
To: info at reallyopenuniversity.org

Dear editors:

I am writing to you as editors of the ROU web site because I would like to
publish a short article (about 850 words) about the so-called 'cuts', in
particular about the human significance of the 'cuts'. In it I claim that
what is above all at stake in the spending review is the kind of human
beings requested and shaped by the current oligarchic regime, and I try to
explain how this process works in its basic aspects. At the core of such
'workings' is the question of education and the university.

I actually wrote it for The Guardian, but they do not want to publish it,
confirming my fears that it is not possible to address absolutely
fundamental issues (I think that what this article addresses has not been
and is not addressed either in newspapers or in more specialised
publications) in the mainstream progressive press - which makes the current
situation all the more worrying. In view of that I have decided to contact
alternative media and see whether the issue I address can see the light,
particularly now that the London demo may have given rise to a new momentum
in this vital struggle.

I copy the piece below and would be most grateful if you consider it for
publication in the web. I have written it in my professional capacity as
university teacher and sociologist (my professional details you can see
below, at the end of this email).

Thanks a lot and best wishes

Carlos Frade

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The significance of the 'spending review' and the true choice we will make
now, whether we want it or not

What is at stake in the spending review is not a question of so-called
'cuts', how massive they will be and whom will be most affected; that is a
merely technical problem which takes for granted the nature and scope of the
real problem. Nor is it only a question, absolutely unacceptable as this is,
of the hardship which hundreds of thousands are bound to undergo. The
gravest problem lies elsewhere.

The facts are plain and well known: a number of major banks lost
inconceivable amounts of money while the bankers amassed and continue to
amass unbelievable sums for which they pay ridiculous taxes. To avoid the
banks' collapse, governments poured in billions of public money to bail them
out, thus becoming heavily indebted. But 'financial markets' don't like such
public deficits, so governments are quick to plan massive public spending
'cuts' in order to reduce the deficits and please 'the markets', that is,
the banks and the bankers. Any mention of tax rises for the well-off is
considered blasphemous, while a campaign just launched against 'benefit
scroungers' <
http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/200030/500-000-benefit-scroungers-will-be-made-to-seek-work/500-000-benefit-scroungers-will-be-made-to-seek-work500-000-benefit-scroungers-will-be-made-to-seek-work500-000-benefit-scroungers-will-be-made-to-seek-work500-000-benefit-scroungers-will-be-made-to-seek-work500-000-benefit-scroungers-will-be-made-to-seek-work>
 (seemingly a very serious thing, as it includes 'benefit cheat hit squads'
<http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11559463> ) is not directed at the
true scroungers and cheats responsible for the catastrophe, but is the usual
ferocious campaign against the poorer and less fortunate. To add insult to
injury we are told by ministers that the 'cuts' which will destroy hundreds
of thousands of family lives and bring havoc to the whole country are 'fair'
- as if words had gone mad and ministers had also been abandoned by the last
human capacity, that of blushing with shame.

How is this possible at all? Four elements account for this situation: an
oligarchy of wealth as ruling group - in truth a plutocracy; a doctrinaire
and extremely contagious political ideology: managerialism; an easily
recruitable executive following: a growing managerial class which occupies
key positions in all institutions and at all levels through the society; and
a standard set of governing tools made up of managerial indicators and above
all indebtedness (compulsory debt-incurring) to which 'all and each' are
yoked: individuals, including ever younger people such as students,
institutions and entire countries.

These four elements make a totally poisonous 'cocktail' - poisonous for
anything to do with human dignity, love for the job well done and for the
public good, freedom, democracy and justice. How does it work? As any such
oligarchy in history, the defining features of the current one are: tireless
quest to squeeze everything out of those beneath them, parvenu disdain for
learning and culture, and total impunity (the only difference with the old
oligarchies being that this one is the result of a subsidised capitalism).
As for those who are not part of the oligarchy, it is basically a question
of unfitness for a free or political way of life, that is to say, of
servitude; but the servitude is voluntary because, in reality, women and men
do not mind yielding their liberty and abdicating their responsibility
through servile submission, since in the process we become petty tyrants
ourselves, and this is a role we seem to end up enjoying, to the point of
mistaking it for the responsibility and liberty we have just surrendered.

This is the kind of human beings that the current regime demands, promotes
and shapes. It requests them from the very beginning, from the cradle, as
the case of university students shows: by yoking students to huge long-term
debts, that is, to what governments all over the world now reject for
themselves like the plague, the recent Browne's review of HE (strangely
called an 'independent' review <
http://www.bis.gov.uk/assets/biscore/corporate/docs/s/10-1208-securing-sustainable-higher-education-browne-report.pdf>
 despite the unmistakable belonging of its author to the aforementioned
oligarchy) seeks to make sure that students will be consumers and nothing
but consumers. The difficulty is that a university degree proper is not
something one can just 'buy', for buying something is the easiest thing to
do if one has money, but a degree demands effort and dedication, qualities
which nobody in their right mind has ever attributed to consumers. That is
why claiming that 'students' paying more will demand 'more' (Browne's
review) is sheer sophistry. 'More' of what? Indeed such 'students' will
demand more easiness, more good-timeness, and will request their
qualifications regardless. Pleasing and flattering angry consumers: that
will be 'teaching', the only 'teaching' permitted by the managerial
indicators of 'student' satisfaction. But it was never a question of
teaching or education; rather the purpose is to transform HE into a market,
that is, into yet another profit-yielding machinery to feed the oligarchy
with what it cherishes most: cripple human beings.

We can thus see the true alternative the so-called 'cuts' place before us,
here and now: either to consecrate a situation of servitude whereby a
country governed like a herd of cattle continues to feed the oligarchy with
its daughters and sons, or to show the resoluteness of able and responsible
women and men to, both collectively and individually, stand up against this
infinite injustice and start to define our own fate. Only hardship without
dignity and pride should be feared. This is the choice: want it or not, we
will choose, and it will be the result of that choice what we will bequeath
to those coming after us.

Carlos Frade

Carlos Frade teaches sociology at the University of Salford (Manchester)

Dr Carlos Frade
Senior Lecturer in Sociology
School of English Sociology Politics & C. History
Centre for Social Research
University of Salford
Greater Manchester M5 4WT (UK)
Tel.: +44 (0) 161 295 6552
Fax: +44 (0) 161 295 5077
Email: C.Frade at salford.ac.uk <mailto:C.Frade at salford.ac.uk>
http://www.espach.salford.ac.uk/page/carlos_frade <
http://www.espach.salford.ac.uk/page/carlos_frade>

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