-ILONIA, India‹In
l967 I went to live and work in a
village for the first time. The most
snobbish,
exclusive and expensive education
that anyone could possibly receive
in India
had hardly prepared me to face the
day-to-day challenges of life and death.
My education
had made me so arrogant, conceited
and supremely confident that I was
prepared
to provide instant solutions and
change the world overnight. I did not
feel the
need to read Marx or Gandhi to prepare
myself.
More
than 35 years later, looking back, my "real" education
started when the un-learning process began subtly,
quietly and without even knowing how it was changing
me inside. Now when I see these yuppies and hot-shot
experts and consultants representing big donors, writing
reports, conducting poverty studies, feasibility reports
and whatever else they call it these days, I see myself
three decades ago. I know now it is useless, futile
and a colossal‹indeed a criminal‹waste
of money because eventually it has never helped the
rural poor (Mahatma Gandhi's "last man"),
but no one seems to have the courage to stop this insane
process. Remember Einstein's definition of insanity: "endlessly
repeating the same process hoping for a different result."
I am convinced there are simple solutions to the
vast problems of poverty. These solutions have
already been tested, shown to be effective, inexpensive
and applicable on a large scale. If only the urban-based,
paper-qualified experts are prepared to listen,
be humble, patient, tolerant and compassionate,
not wearing blinkers or arriving with pre-conceived
solutions. The formal educational system makes
monsters out of these young people and we let them
loose in the countryside. What solutions do they
tell the rural poor about poverty that the poor
do not know already?
The sad lesson I have learned is that the people
who control and sanction the funds invariably turn
out to be mediocre, lacking courage, status-quo-oriented
and playing safe. The sinister message that comes
across is that for the sake of their jobs they
would like the level of poverty to increase.
The
rural poor taught me how useless and pointless
paper degrees
and qualifications are: They just
get in the way of trying, risking, innovating‹because
there is a fear of failing. Then what would people
say? The possibility of learning from "successful
failures" does not exist in the world of experts.
For me the definition of an expert is an ordinary
man from another town. Today the rural poor have
shown us we do not really need an urban-trained,
paper-qualified engineer, doctor, teacher or architect
in the rural areas. The people at the village level
have the practical knowledge, the skills and the
wisdom to carry out these so-called technical and
professional tasks. So why do we send these greedy,
frustrated, corrupt, shortsighted and incompetent
people to the villages? This is insanity.
We have never given the rural poor a chance to
teach us. We are impatient. We are in a hurry.
And we do not have the humility to learn from others
whom we consider socially and intellectually inferior
because they do not have a degree next to their
name. Actually my 35 years with the rural poor
have taught me how infinitely superior the poor
are when it comes to showing humanity, compassion,
generosity, practical skills and their capacity
to learn with dignity. They have so much more self
esteem. So that is why no paper-qualified expert
is welcome in the Barefoot College. All who flaunt
their degrees are disqualified because they have
been corrupted by the formal educational system.
Bunker Roy founded the Barefoot College in Tilonia,
Rajasthan state of India
|
