Education has been used as a political tool across the world and throughout the ages. It has been a force to bolster the political rationale of regimes and to define national identity. In this timely contribution to the political dimension of education, Marie Lall and Edward Vickers have put together a unique collection of interdisciplinary essays that examine “the nexus between state ideology, different forms of nationalism and the socialization of the youth through curriculum” (p. 1) in ten Asian societies.
Of the four chapters devoted to East Asia, two focus on China. Edward Vickers analyses the impact of the state-endorsed patriotic education campaign on the development of national identity since the early 1990s. Efforts have been made not only to restore the regime's damaged legitimacy after 1989, but also to offset the effects of China's integration into the global economy. Drawing on textbooks for Chinese history particularly moral education (in the form of the sixiang pinde subject), Vickers illustrates the transformation of Chinese education as a tool of political socialization in the past two decades from a Marxist-socialist orientation to a nationalist-patriotic bent.
For example, a lesson entitled “Let's Choose Determination” tells the story of a student who did not study well until she picked up a book on the Opium War and was “struck by the sentence: ‘Not studying leads to backwardness, and backwardness leads to getting beaten.’ So I resolved to study hard in order to become a dignified and imposing (tangtang zhengzheng) Chinese person who would never submit to foreign bullying” (pp. 69–70). Another lesson entitled “Be a Self-Confident Chinese Person” relates the experience of a well-known scientist Dong Di-Zhou in the West. According to the lesson, Dong was humiliated by the remarks of a Western fellow student who asserted that China was poor because the Chinese were “stupid.” Dong responded “I can't allow you to insult my compatriots and my motherland!” He then challenged the student to a competition to see who would first receive his PhD and Dong won. Vickers argues that a state-centred patriotism is enshrined as “a fundamental source in itself of other values and aspirations upon which social harmony and progress depend” (p. 69).
Parallel to the trend in the PRC, in chapter four Paul Morris observes that since the 1997 handover Hong Kong has shown signs of shifting toward a form of nationalism that is favoured by the Beijing regime. In chapter two, Peter Cave highlights the history of the problematic relationship between the individual and the state in modern Japanese education: in the context of the emergence of Japan's East Asian neighbours (China and Korea), a more nationalistic view not only has returned, but also has become more “vociferous” and “well-organized.” Taiwan is briefly dealt with in the comparative chapter one, but the volume would have benefited from a solid chapter on Taiwan to complement the other East Asian chapters.
For Southeast Asia, Christine Han presents the educational dilemma faced by the government of Singapore: Whereas since its independence in 1965 the government was able to use education as an effective tool to shape a loyal citizenry and an able work force, today in the era of globalization, the government perceives a need to promote the development of creative thinking while also struggling to maintain the officially endorsed paternalistic “Asian values.” Elwyn Thomas shows that in Malaysia, where Malay identity and language have dominated education for decades since independence, often at the cost of the cultures of other racial and ethnic groups (notably that of the Malaysian Chinese), the government has begun to realize that in order to be successful globally, the school curriculum should address more intercultural concerns. In this sense, Vietnam's nationalist education presents perhaps fewer contradictions and tensions, according to Matthieu Salomon and Vu Doan Ket, because the country fought a patriotic war and achieved national reunification just four decades ago, and the Chinese can always be conveniently used as an “enemy” (in the past and present) to reinforce the patriotic education.
Perceptively, Vickers compares in chapters one and three the political implications of a state-run educational system saturated with overrun patriotism in Japan and China, with reference to the work of the early 20th-century American sociologist, Thorstein Veblen. While contemporary Chinese education appears on a similar trajectory to Meiji Japan, Vickers asserts that the pace of China's “industrial arts,” “consumerism” and globalization in general are developing even faster than they were in Japan a century ago. Only future will tell if such cosmopolitan factors will be able to balance out a narrowly perceived and indoctrinated Chinese nationalism. In this regards, it would have been more thought-provoking if Vickers had discussed the treatment of democratization or anti-democratization as reflected in the Chinese curricula and the possible impact on “China's opportunity.”
The volume distinguishes itself with its analyses of textbooks and curricula in often subtle and nuanced contexts, and the authors’ critical examinations of what education is being used for, and the effects of the politicization of education on society in the era of globalization. The chapters reflect the challenges Asian societies face to achieve a balance between preserving traditions and integrating into the wider world community. The conclusion, as Vickers cautions, is that “the tensions between politics, identity and schooling lie primarily not in any civilization clash with ‘the West’.” On the contrary, the fundamental struggles are internal rather than international. In other words, the “state-directed efforts at identity formation both for internal social and political stability, and for inter-state relations” (p. 11) remain the dominant factor in shaping education in a given nation.
