Sunday Posts

Narratives matter for the economy. The point is somewhat obvious, but the Nobel laureate economist Robert Shiller re-emphasizes the point in a new book ( a preview here ). Yet, as Shiller argues correctly, we miss this point all too often. We claim that data will speak for itself, but people think in terms of overarching stories rather than nuanced arguments. And, in this, I shall argue, Bengal misses a trick. By Bengal, I mean the state of West Bengal in India. This sliver of the ancient state of Bengal, which became prosperous and pre-eminent in Indian politics for a variety of environmental (changing courses of rivers), historical (the gradual shift of influence from Dhaka to Calcutta, via Murshidabad) and economic (early emergence of capitalist class through privatization of land ownership, spread of English education and emergence of a hub of global trade) reasons, is - by common perception - in a state of decline. When I use Bengal, I am only using the popular shortha...

The paradox at the heart of middle class lives is this - it is an unending pursuit of mediocrity. I know we want to see it differently. The great middle class dream is the pursuit of happiness, in Jefferson's classic formulation. Happiness is about setting an achievable limit and being content with that. Happiness is an end, it is about stopping at a reasonable level, and not aspiring for more. It is about being what you can comfortably be. Which is, seen the glass half empty way, mediocrity. Surely, pursuit of unhappiness would not inspire anyone. But this is indeed at the heart of educational enterprise, of the idea of an examined life. It is about continuously testing one's limit, a pursuit to escape the comfort zones. Even when everything seems content, the point of education is to question the very contentedness, and to introduce perspectives, spatialities and temporalities: No happiness is complete, all encompassing and lasts forever, is the inevitable verdict...

I wrote earlier about How To Build An University to argue that our current paradigms are flawed. My essential point was that the university, more than its buildings, curriculum and facilities, is a community, and this should be the key consideration for building an university. I wanted to add to this thought, how one may put the community at the heart of university-making, and think through some of the practical implications. This argument that one may need to look at the University as a Community is old, and indeed, the first universities were conceived as communities more than anything else. This is also at the heart of a sophisticated business argument - Clayton Christensen and his coauthors argued for adopting an 'User Network Business Model' for the universities - and this did become a talking point when venture investment in education was raging. I did write about it then (See Education 2.0: Universities As User Networks , Universities As User Networks: An Update ...

Because businesses need more and more skilled people to do the jobs, they are the key beneficiaries of education. This has not always been the case - the Church and the Government needed educated people more than businesses until very recently - but in a secular society and with the age of small governments, that has changed. Today, the businesses are perhaps the largest recipient of the educated people, and for most students, education is about preparing for a career in business. Indeed, this does not mean that education does not have any other purpose, but it is best to recognise this changing perspective about education. What the educators should, or shouldn't, do in this changed context gets discussed all too often. However, what does not get proportionate attention is what businesses need to do. The businesses often complain that they don't get the trained manpower that they need to remain competitive, and they expect the education sector to deliver them what they ne...

We live in an exceptional time. Though this isn't a quote from the excellent Foreign Affairs essay written by Erik Brynjolfsson, Andrew McAfee and Michael Spence ( read it here ) but somewhat its central message: That automation is now reaching a certain tipping point in capability, and with it, it is changing the dynamic of globalisation, ending the party for low cost labour and instead creating a Power Law economy, where a creative elite reap most of the rewards and most other lose out even more completely. Indeed, the authors argue that this is already happening: They report that China may have lost over 30 million manufacturing jobs, 25% of the total, since 1996 (though, the authors note, the data is unreliable because of a change in the way it was gathered) , though at the same time, manufacturing output has expanded at an exponential rate. Foxconn's (and of others) automation projects appear to be the obvious reason. This also bears out on anecdotal observation: Joshua ...

Industrial age has long ended, the pundits proclaimed, and we live in the information age. Indeed, the world in perspective is downtown LA, not some remote areas of Congo, where some farming tools, if they could be afforded, would be a good idea. However, once the proclamation is printed in books legitimised by top publishers' logos and the authors credentials longer than their names, it must be believed. Further, that idea is already in vogue and typing these words on a remote computer hooked in some network, I seem to be voting affirmative with my action. However, one question remains though: It seems that history has indeed accelerated a bit too fast, and this information age, or network economy or whichever name one calls it, is precariously close to catastrophe just after it has barely began. Call it the revenge of Congo, where children who would consider themselves lucky to have a decent meal a day and would not miss anything if the Information Age ends tomorrow: However...

Background This essay intends to explore the issue of educational quality in the context of a For-Profit Business School based in London. This is a privately owned business, which offers a Master of Business Administration (MBA) programme validated by a British university, and caters to mostly students coming from overseas. The school has no degree awarding power and has to follow the academic regulations of the validating university. The MBA degree is awarded by the validating university after the students successfully complete 8 taught modules and a dissertation. The Business School had to undergo an extensive review of its financial and academic capabilities to achieve validation to deliver the MBA programme. The validation was achieved following a well-defined university process. The university took great care to look at the financial records and management practices of the institution, as part of their initial vetting visit, and following this, the course, pro...