The recent remarks from a teacher at a leading ed-tech company, advocating for voting in favour of educated politicians, have garnered significant national attention. However, while avoiding partisanship, the comments triggered another political duel over whether formal education determines a politician’s leadership abilities. It is tempting to support formal educational qualifications as an eligibility condition for political representatives. Yet, employing formal education as a measure of political acumen and leadership calibre can be problematic. It’s crucial to acknowledge that any kind of leadership requires a distinct form of learning, which often goes beyond the traditional curriculum in formal educational institutions.
We must remember that the core duty of every elected representative in a democracy is advocating for their constituents during the legislative processes and overseeing local development. Additionally, in parliamentary democracies, many representatives shoulder the responsibility for executive positions. Successful political leaders have a wide range of proficiencies encompassing a deep understanding of social dynamics and evolving societal needs to effectively fulfil public aspirations. Prima facie, such skills and competencies need not always be acquired within the confines of a classroom.
The complex relationship between education and competent political leadership belies the simplistic narratives often presented. While convincing rationales exist for foundational formal literacy, similar reasoning does not apply to higher education. Lahoti and Sahoo (2020) discovered negligible disparities in the capacity of comparatively well-educated political leaders to enhance educational outcomes in India. Similarly, the study conducted by Jain, Kashyap, Lahoti, and Sahoo (2022) indicated that politicians holding graduate degrees didn’t significantly enhance public goods provisioning in India. Conclusive proof that educated politicians lead to better governance outcomes is lacking, thereby weakening the rationale for mandatory educational qualifications. Merely acquiring more degrees does not guarantee better governance. Effective governance necessitates politicians to have undergone a distinct kind of learning.
In the past, some state governments in India have imposed minimum qualifications for local government elections. However, this silver-bullet approach is a misfire. As a reminder, the matter of educational qualifications for elected representatives was deliberated upon in the Constituent Assembly and consciously put aside after extensive consideration. Paradoxically, the debate on minimum qualification turns into one of maximum qualification when a handful of elected representatives assert superior governing capabilities solely due to their possession of technical degrees, such as engineering, law, and medicine, from prestigious institutions. By endorsing only professional and technical degrees as the yardstick of “being educated”, an exclusionary stance is propagated. How much of a role their degree has played in developing their political instinct and how successful they are is a different debate and part of the public assessment, but their comments have created enough buzz in public.
Furthermore, endorsing the imposition of predefined formal education promotes an elitist governance outlook. Mandating merely formal education risks sidelining alternative knowledge traditions, especially those of tribal communities. Leaders from various communities may not have completed fancy degrees, but their awareness of public needs and aspirations could be unmatchable.
Advocating for mandated educational requisites brings up a multitude of critical questions. If the educational degree is the criterion, what educational level will be deemed adequate? Will a Ph.D. be the benchmark, or will an undergraduate degree be sufficient? Further, will all academic disciplines be acknowledged as eligible qualifications, especially given the Indian society’s fondness for professional and technical degrees that attract higher salaries? Even after deciding on the degrees, preferences for institutions could come into play. Foreign degrees might be favoured over Indian ones, and even among Indian institutions, preferences might lean toward more prestigious institutions such as IIMs and IITs. Ultimately, who holds the authority to determine these answers, and what determines their preferences and decisions? The manner in which these questions are resolved might inadvertently reflect society’s inherent biases or a minority view. As the country moves forward in the Amrit Kaal, the focus should be on strengthening India’s vibrant democracy, not caging it. It also raises a pertinent question about the knowledge hierarchy and how people from specific positions approve of someone’s knowledge in a subjective way.
This elitist perspective also fails to understand the intricacies of public policy and governance, which are domains that involve engaging with people. Even meticulously crafted policies grounded in scientific principles sometimes falter when confronted with local political, social, and economic complexities. The challenge of countering uncountable unknowns in policy-making often cannot be squeezed into straightforward and tidy paths, as often propagated by those inclined towards technocracy. A degree ultimately is a function of specific tests and assessments. Hence, acquiring a degree from even the world’s most famous institutions is insufficient if it doesn’t help in recognising society’s needs and challenges.
To be fair, there is great merit in the overarching objective advocated by proponents of minimum reading-writing skills — the pursuit of effective governance. The discontent and frustration against entrenched governance problems and misconduct are undeniably justified. To counter such misgovernance, election as a mechanism has been devised and must be appropriately used. They empower citizens to withhold authority from those they consider lacking in the essential skills and capabilities necessary to achieve the desired governance form.
It is not the case that policy formulation and public administration are endeavours that can be pursued effectively without education and training. Our most famous political and social leaders didn’t restrict their education to conventional classroom boundaries and travelled extensively across the country and directly interacted with and learnt from the people they were seeking to serve.
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In a country like India, where the higher education Gross Enrolment Ratio is still under 30, higher education qualification can not be a criterion to govern. In a democracy, the discourse should be more inclusive. For the sake of political gain, political parties are trying to initiate an exclusive debate that is not in sync with the democratic ethos of the country.
Society is now evolving and giving more emphasis on experiential learning, which comes from ground experience, but our political parties and leaders are focusing on academic qualifications. Ultimately, you only live with the experience you have gained through your interaction with society or other institutions. It is your experience and skill that matters to you, not the paper on which your degree is printed. The world is moving toward experiential learning while our education system still gives more importance to a degree.
The writer is director of Center of Policy Research and Governance and educationalist
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