Elephant in the [Class] Room

Daniel Hoffman-Gill offers an interesting opinion on the alienation of the white working classes in the UK. Essentially, he does not want to see this group left behind and the comments that follow his blog posting highlight the differing (read 'divisive') points of view on the issue. Whatever we think however, it remains true, that white working class children have the lowest levels of academic achievement in schools and remain the most socially immobile of all the demographic groups within the UK (see the Joseph Rowntree Report). Invariably, schools that take these children in will have a bigger cultural issue to tackle in their communities that they serve and are challenged with breaking a culture of low aspiration at the individual, parental and societal level. It's a tall order.  

Sir Robin Bosher of the Harris Federation of Academies, describes his findings: "I see about 10 per cent in each class who are so unsociable that they hurt others, adults and other young children. But they’re unsociable because they’ve no practice at being sociable." Compare that to other 'poor' groups - European Muslim migrants, people learning in a non-native language and so on. Think also of people in the developing world who live a hand-to-mouth existence who also start off with disadvantage. The difference is, in general, these groups tend to value education and see it as a key to social mobility. 

As an educator, with a body of experience in several countries, it goes without saying that I believe that education is an important means to meet the needs of the wider social good. I cannot ignore, however, that in England education is way too (negatively) politicised and this makes education as a public service vulnerable to constant government manipulation. The challenges, however, of being at the chalk-face on a daily basis means that educators have a different perspective on the social matters that children bring into school and meeting the needs of the white working class is not as simple as another set of reforms. 

It would be fair to conclude that essentially 65 years of exhaustive educational reform in the UK has not delivered on closing the educational achievement gaps for white working class children or driving up their aspirations. The occasional examples that highlight traditionally working class people being the first in their families to access higher education are something of an illusory distraction. Progress to university remains a mainly upwardly mobile, middle-class aspiration. 

The social mobility arguments remain at the cornerstone of the 'moral purpose' behind education and there is some expectation that schools pick up the task of changing social and behavioural cultures. Scaled up on a nationwide level, is this possible or appropriate? I would understand if people thought that education plays a part in social reform, but in all honestly, despite the many dedicated professional educators who reach out to vulnerable communities, nearly 70 years after the post war education reforms began, who is actually responsible for breaking the culture of non-aspiration? Do we continue to respond to white working class low achievement with more resources or changing how teachers and schools are judged? 

Elephant in the [Class] Room 

It would be wise to stop, pause and consider why (and for whom) we aim to push through unchecked reforms. Are we missing the elephant in the room? What is it about white working class children that puts obstacles in their paths for achievement? Should our responses be 'politically challenging' rather than 'politically correct'? Is it okay to be critical of a consumerist, hedonistic culture that doesn't prioritise education? Can we honestly expect a completely universal educational approach/examinations system to work for all? Can we accept equality when we live is a society divided by class and race? Should political interventions be removed once and for all from education?

Malala Yousafzai commented a few weeks ago about British teenagers not appreciating their educational opportunities. She was right. I have seen schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan and know the conditions under which children learn. They aspire for better and in the most dangerous and poorly funded conditions, the fight for education is being bravely fronted by children. In comparison children in the UK are very fortunate and to have a public educational culture that is supported by a generous financial investment per pupil that remains amongst the highest in the world. Isn't a quality, free education a very real golden opportunity that some are simply giving up?

There is an elephant in the room. Are we prepared to admit it?

Find out more about Education Reform here

History of Education in the UK: Wikipedia
Arc of Underachievement: BBC
The Underclass: Prisma

To Tweet or to Blog?

I've been busy and a lot has happened in the world since my last posting so it's easy to let important events slip. Perhaps this is because we are forced to sometimes tune out of this world is that is bulging in information overload. With the sheer volume of news stories being run in the media at any particular time we are making an important choice and allow in only what is relevant into our conciousness. At least, I find I do. We can even develop a resistance to the shock and the negative energy that is the news. I have come to the conclusion that sometimes TV news must come in small doses and that in order to hold on to my own sanity it is wise to just switch off and to accept that there are only some things I am able to change.

And so, this past month, news stories have come and gone. Whilst seemingly on a sabbatical from Blogger, I have been updating things of interest on Twitter. Sometimes I don't have as much to say or, I don't want to carry the burdens of the world on my heart and soul. With Twitter, I can easily flag up a story or article of interest whilst I'm on the go. Blogger requires me to sit down when I have a quiet moment. I'm sure someone out there will be doing a study on the links between the different users of social media and the technologies they use. Broadly I go with Twitter for mobile technologies such as my Smartphone and Blogging when I'm at my home laptop (other matters having been dealt with). 

So here I am, nothing much to react to at the moment, but that's okay. Sanity is important.

The Richard Dawkins Tweet

Richard Dawkins's infamous Tweet that the entire Muslim world has had fewer Nobels (10) than Cambridge University's Trinity College (32) has invited both support and opposition. Political correctness might dictate that he should not have spoken, but as an atheist whose scientific/socially liberal viewpoints line up with popular sentiment his tweet is pointed out as one example of Western irreverence towards religion. The coin has a flip-side too; we live in a world where Islam is feared and Muslims are vilified. It is easy to target Muslims and get away with it.

Dawkins is not alone in attacking Muslims for their lack of achievements; I know many  Muslims who share the  same critical view of themselves. At the present time, Muslims do not export their cultural achievements well. We live, at best in a nostalgic past. Our human rights records, as an example, is little more to be proud of than our list of Nobel honours and more Muslims are dying at the hands of other Muslims in a kind of fratricidal in-war than directly at the hands of Western interventionist forces. Elsewhere, Muslims are caught up in a loop of blame, low achievement, bad governance, cultural destruction and self-pity. In summary, we're on something of a downer. Something is deeply wrong and for Muslims this requires some deep and sober appreciation.

The low ebb for Muslims sits within a much larger context (of power, control and prejudice). For a start, Dawkins could have easily substituted 'Muslims' in his Tweet for any other group or demographic. According to the Christian Monitor, other large (billion-plus) religious, gender and ethnic groups have won even fewer Nobels than the ten won by Muslims. Hindus have won four, the Chinese have won eight and Africans have won nine. Note also that women have only won 44 Nobel Prizes, compared with 791 for (mostly) white men. Frankly, Nobel Prizes are a largely Western affair - all the more grating since one of four people in the world are Muslim.

The Nobel Prizes were inaugurated in 1901 at a time when Muslims were still under the long shadow of colonial rule. Alfred Nobel (inventor of dynamite) may have emphasised recognition of scientific and technological discoveries and inventions, but since its launch, the awarding of the prizes have never truly been a universal affair. They can't be. What do the committees who offer the Nobel Prizes measure, except a particular (socially skewed) view of scientific achievement? 

Not everyone can consume or pollute at the rate of the US and Western Europe and the number of nuclear bombs discovered, developed and used by the West outweighs the number used by the entire planet. Money talks. Muslims may not have invented nuclear weapons - but when there are other pressing matters, should Muslims put all their energies and focus into winning Nobel Prizes?

Logically speaking, if Muslims do not lead in the inventiveness that creates weapons of mass destructions that devastate the planet, then the flip-side is they don't lead in the responsibility for the overall damage. Dawkins, like many atheists and agnostics falls into a trap of targetting Islam under the impression that their scientific credentials put them above simplistic prejudice. There are agendas dressed up in 'facts' underlying deeper prejudices are masked by pseudo-rationalism.

Read more at Religion Dispatches and the Guardian.

Two-Muslim Theory: Part 2

... continued from previous posting ...

Changing the Narrative

Nawabzada Liaqat Ali Khan was was born in 1895 to a Muslim aristocrat family whose jagir started at the eastern edge of Punjab (now Haryana) and stretched into Uttar Pradesh. His family had cordial relations with the British. His grandfather extended support to the British during the hard times of 1857 and his father earned many titles and honours.

Liaqat Ali went to Aligarh and then to Oxford. On his return from London in 1923, he joined Muslim League. He contested his first elections in 1926 on a seat reserved for Muslims in the UP Assembly (Muzaffarnagar constituency) and comfortably won. He grew into an eloquent parliamentarian, pleading mostly for the causes of Muslim landlords who were a minority in that province.

He became one of the most important members of the Muslim League's vanguard. Nawabzada is, in fact, credited to have convinced a dejected and disappointed Muhammad Ali Jinnah to end his 'self-imposed exile' in London and lead the movement for a separate homeland for Muslims. Liaqat Ali Khan was made the General Secretary of the Muslim League in 1936.

The party's parliamentary committee did not award him the ticket for the 1936 elections for his home constituency which he valued highly. Despite holding a high office in the Muslim League, he contested as an independent from his home constituency and faced criticism of fellow party men.

He contested the 1946 elections for the Central Legislative Assembly on the Muslim seat of Meerut in Uttar Pradesh. Following this victory, Liaqat Ali won a place in the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan and at independence was made the first Prime Minister with the additional charge of Foreign Affairs and Commonwealth Relations and Defense. He remained the longest serving prime minister until Yousuf Raza Gilani exceeded him by a few weeks recently.

Prime Minister Liaqat Ali is accredited with a number of ground breaking contributions. He decided to ally with the US in the Cold War divide; quashed a coup attempt by communists; promoted General Ayub to the highest rank and fought a war with India over Kashmir to name just a select few. His government ruled on ad hoc basis under temporary laws as it could not formulate and build a consensus on a constitution for the country.

Reasons were simple. They could not dig out a monarchy to rule the country nor could they install a Caliph. The constitution had to be based on democracy. But the problem was that Meerut was now in India. The most powerful Prime Minister serving for one of the longest periods in the history of Pakistan had no constituency in the country to contest elections from. A committed democrat and an active parliamentarian, he  knew well that he and his political class had no, or at best a very shaky, future under a democracy. In contrast, Bacha Khan's was a completely secure political position. It was impossible to democratically uproot him from his constituency. He had voters, volunteers and diehard loyalists.

The ad hoc powers were thus used to change the rules of the game. Six months after the death of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Prime Minister Liaqat Ali Khan moved the Objective Resolution in the Constituent Assembly that introduced Islam as the raison d'être of the new country. Religion was pitched against linguistic and cultural identity and faith was made to rival political interests. Those loving their culture, defending their language and demanding their democratic and political rights on these grounds became heretics conspiring against the last citadel of Islam in the Subcontinent. Ideological boundaries of the country became more important than the limits of electoral constituencies and principles of democracy were contrasted to injunctions of Islam as defined by a selected ulema.

Bacha Khan who enjoyed a hard earned and unflinching popular support in a vast constituency went down in official gazettes as an anti-Pakistan traitor. Red Shirts were hounded and hunted. Politicians were jailed and elections were rigged.

By declaring the entire country as one constituency and setting ones perceived Islamic credentials as the only qualification, Liaqat Ali Khan tried to create a constituency for his class – the politically insecure Muslim elite that had migrated from the Muslim minority provinces of India. But ironically, they could not sustain their hold on this constituency for long. Within a decade they were outdone by the Army in the game they had pioneered. They were declared incapable of defending the citadel of Islam. The army took over the 'responsibility' of keeping the country united in the name of Islam and secure from the conspirators who had strong democratic constituencies in the country.

The army did not feel the need to redraft the national narrative that was scripted in those initial years. It was found to be in perfect harmony with the Army's own scheme to block or cripple democracy and sustain its direct or indirect rule for decades to come. The narrative persists with all its detail and corollaries and insists on its refusal to recognise Bacha Khan as a great national hero.

Two-Muslim Theory: Part 1

Article originally by Tahir Mehdi appeared in the Dawn. Presented here in an adapted format. 

Introducing Bacha Khan

When someone says 'Muslims of Indo-Pak subcontinent' with reference to history, does this refer to one unanimous, monolithic block of people with no shades and diversity? The reality is divergent political interests and ambitions of Muslims throughout the subcontinents history before and beyond the period that ended on this day 65 years ago. A reintroduction to these groups and how the new state of Pakistan responded to their political aspirations might help us understand where we stand now.

Pre-partition Muslims can be classified in many ways beyond sectarian differences within Islam. The followers of one sect are not a completely homologous group either, as they may differ on other counts like economic class, cast, language, culture etc. These attributes have an impact on way people behave and act in spheres of economy, politics, culture and even faith. It's only natural to consider that all these factors make one what he or she is. Instead of labouring over an academically-sound definition of each, this post offers an example of one person from two of these two groups.

Abdul Ghaffar Khan was born in 1890 to rural middle-class Pakhtun parents of Utmanzai, a small town in the present day district of Charssadda. At the age of 20 he opened a school in his village. He had woken up to the fact that his people have no future if they don't educate themselves and their children. The tall, young man proved to be a zealous missionary. He would walk for miles from one village to the other with his simple message – educate yourself and abstain from violence. He was a devout Muslim, a five-timer namazi parhaizgar and would draw heavily from Islamic history and the Prophet's sayings to rally fellow Pakhtuns. People joined him in droves. 

His appeal matured into charisma and in his 30s, he founded a social reform movement named Khudai Khidmatgar (Servants of God). By now he was named Badshah Khan or Bacha Khan. The movemen gave its volunteers a uniform that was red and organised them on the pattern of a militia that was, in his words, armed "with the weapon of the Prophet – that is, patience and righteousness. No power on earth can stand against it." It was only Bacha Khan who could unarm Pakhtuns who otherwise were considered quarrelsome and trigger-happy.

The Red Shirts, as the volunteers of the movement were known as, were against the British rule and demanded self government. For the British, the then province of NWFP had great strategic importance. It was a so-called buffer against the Afghan government that was not friendly with the Raj and also against the Russians whom the British dreaded as their rivals.

The Bolshevik revolution of Russia in 1917 was emerging as a huge challenge for Imperialism. It had a natural affinity with the nations oppressed by the British. The Russian revolution was colored red. The sight of a Red Shirt in the Peshawar valley gave the British a fright. At Qisa Khani Bazar in 1930, the frenzied British forces fired directly at a protest rally of unarmed Khudai Khidmatgars killing many hundreds. The movement and its committed cadre did not budge. They stood fast. Many estimate that at its peak there were as many as a hundred thousand Red Shirts.

When the British adopted a cautious policy of sharing power with local political forces and initiated limited franchise elections, the group allied with Indian National Congress. It contested successive elections, won majority and formed governments in the province. As the British hated them, they would conspire against the Red Shirts and jailed Bacha Khan frequently and for long periods but could not undo the politicisation of the Pakhtun middle class that he had initiated.

Pakhtun felt comfortable with Congress and that didn't bear out of some personal friendship between the top leaders. Congress accommodated politics of budding smaller sub-national groups, offered them space for growth and opportunity to integrate with others without giving much consideration to religion. On the other hand, Bacha Khan did not owe his 'fearlessness' vis a vis Hindus to Pakhtun chivalric traditions, instead he had earned this confidence through successive electoral victories. He had a large constituency where Muslims were in majority. There were Hindus too but Pakhtuns did not see Hindus as threat to their religion or politics.

Despite its vociferous campaign Muslim League could not ignite fears of Hindu domination in the support base of Bacha Khan. His comrades won the land mark elections of 1946 with a thumping majority. He opposed the Partition on the basis of religion, but it happened. His democratically elected government was dismissed 8 days after the independence, on 22 August, 1947 when Muhammad Ali Jinnah was the Governor General and Liaqat Ali Khan was the Prime Minister.

read more in the next posting

Political Disenchantment

A few days back, I came across an article in the Independent newspaper that reported an interesting, if not startling figure. "The public’s disenchantment with Westminster is now so severe senior Conservative figures fear the party’s membership has fallen to 100,000 for the first time in modern politics – a fraction of its three million heyday."

That is especially significant because Tories are still the ruling party, but only just - they were forced to form a coalition which could easily have  kept them out of power. The victors, therefore, were the Lib Dems, and unless there is a resurgence in public participation in the political process, they are likely to be around for a while. Today's political landscape is very bland and the very thin mandate that the present government has highlights a worrying disenchantment that cuts across society. There is nothing but more of the same on the political menu and nothing to separate the choices from one another. In their desperation to appeal to the masses, the political parties have occupied the middle ground and no longer inspire or motivate and the demise of memberships to British party politics only reaffirms our distance.  

Maybe we do not engage because there is no urgency when our bellies are full. Our situations are not the same as those elsewhere. The restiveness witnessed in various parts of the middle east has been an important indicator of a new type of politics. However, can we learn from this?  Perhaps, in time, the social media will override traditional party politics. I certainly hope that the pressure and changes that the social media can bring about continues to grow. This way we can become an instant part of the debate, challenge the current illusion of choice and be politically 'incorrect' if need be. 

Read: I Love Politics, I Hate Politics, It's Complicated by Matthew Paul Turner

اختر مو مبارک شه

اختر مو مبارک شه
لر او بر مو مبارک شه
حساب شی په حاجیانوهم غازیانو روژی مو شه قبولې
دا صبر مو مبارک شه

اختر مو مبارک شه
لر او بر مو مبارک شه
د هوا په لور وچته والوتلي دا د هسکو غرو د پاسه

  لوی وزر مو مبارک شه

اختر مو مبارک شه
لر او بر مو مبارک شه
چی درد پکی لرې په غم د وروڼو داسی زړونه هم

  ځیګر مو مبارک شه

اختر مو مبارک شه
لر او بر مو مبا رک شه
چی کتل په یوه قیسم کړی د وروڼو

داسی سترګی او نظر مو مبارک شه
 

اختر مو مبارک شه
لر او بر مو مبارک شه
لر او بر خو کور د پښتونخوا ده ټول پکی ځای شوی

 دا ټغر مو مبارک شه
 

اختر مو مبارک شه
لر او بر مو مبارک شه
په تاسی چی د زړه مینه راوړی

 داسی زړونه هم بشر مو مبارک شه
 

اختر مو مبارک شه
لر او بر مو مبارک شه
هم د لر او هم د بر شوی

 دا د وصل جوړ بندر مو مبارک شه
 

اختر مو مبارک شه
لر او بر مو مبارک شه
ادیبان او شاعران به تا سره وی

 دا دعلم په میدان کی لوی لښکر مو مبارک شه
 

اختر مو مبارک شه
لر او بر مو مبارک شه
لټون درته سلام او احترام کړی

 ای پښتونه وروره دا خبر مو مبارک شه
 

اختر د مبارک شه
لر او بر د مبارک شه

داود لټون