Not for Profit by Nussbaum Martha C.; Nussbaum Martha C.;

Author:Nussbaum, Martha C.; Nussbaum, Martha C.; [Nussbaum, Martha C.; Nussbaum, Martha C.;]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780691173320
Publisher: PrincetonUP
Published: 2016-07-15T05:00:00+00:00

We live in a world in which people face one another across gulfs of geography, language, and nationality. More than at any time in the past, we all depend on people we have never seen, and they depend on us. The problems we need to solve—economic, environmental, religious, and political—are global in their scope. They have no hope of being solved unless people once distant come together and cooperate in ways they have not before. Think of global warming; decent trade regulations; the protection of the environment and animal species; the future of nuclear energy and the dangers of nuclear weapons; the movement of labor and the establishment of decent labor standards; the protection of children from trafficking, sexual abuse, and forced labor. All these can only truly be addressed by multinational discussions. Such a list could be extended almost indefinitely.

Nor do any of us stand outside this global interdependency. The global economy has tied all of us to distant lives. Our simplest decisions as consumers affect the living standard of people in distant nations who are involved in the production of products we use. Our daily lives put pressure on the global environment. It is irresponsible to bury our heads in the sand, ignoring the many ways in which we influence, every day, the lives of distant people. Education, then, should equip us all to function effectively in such discussions, seeing ourselves as “citizens of the world,” to use a time-honored phrase, rather than merely as Americans, or Indians, or Europeans.

In the absence of a good grounding for international cooperation in the schools and universities of the world, however, our human interactions are likely to be mediated by the thin norms of market exchange in which human lives are seen primarily as instruments for gain. The world’s schools, colleges, and universities therefore have an important and urgent task: to cultivate in students the ability to see themselves as members of a heterogeneous nation (for all modern nations are heterogeneous), and a still more heterogeneous world, and to understand something of the history and character of the diverse groups that inhabit it.

This aspect of education requires a lot of factual knowledge that students who grew up even thirty years ago almost never got, at least in the United States: knowledge about the varied subgroups (ethnic, national, religious, gender based) that comprise one’s own nation, their achievements, struggles, and contributions; and similarly complex knowledge about nations and traditions outside one’s own. (We always taught young people about small parts of the world, but until very recently, we never tried to cover the major nations and regions in a systematic way, treating all regions as significant.) Knowledge is no guarantee of good behavior, but ignorance is a virtual guarantee of bad behavior. Simple cultural and religious stereotypes abound in our world: for example, the facile equation of Islam with terrorism. The way to begin combating these is to make sure that from a very early age students learn a different relation to the world, mediated by correct facts and respectful curiosity.

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