Rethinking Schooling for the 21st Century

However, official rhetoric is one thing, classroom implementation often quite
another — and rhetoric itself frequently faces in multiple directions, seeking to
please different constituencies (foreign as well as domestic). In a region where
postcolonial nation-building is still widely perceived as a novel, fragile and
incomplete undertaking, human resource development and the moulding of
loyal, patriotic citizens remain highly prioritised objectives of national education
systems. Both these economic and nationalist imperatives have combined to
make learning a frequently uneven, narrowly focussed and stressful experience
for students. Expanding shadow education and problems such as student bullying
are both symptomatic of that stress, and factors contributing to its exacerbation.
Transnationalism, promoted in SDG 4.7 under the rubric of ‘global citizenship’, is
essential for the effective and sustainable pursuit of environmental conservation
and international peace. Southeast Asia possesses a significant structure for
promoting transnational collaboration — ASEAN — and UNESCO has been involved
in efforts to use education to promote the idea of ‘ASEAN-ness’ across the
region (Hirata, 2016). However, there is as of yet little evidence to suggest that
ASEAN is operating as a catalyst for consciousness of a shared regional destiny
that transcends the competitive state-formation projects of its various member
nations. Rather, regionalism in Southeast Asia, as embodied by ASEAN, appears
to be project pursued for narrowly instrumentalist, economic and strategic
purposes by elites for whom any challenge to the absolute supremacy of the
nation-state remains utterly unconscionable.
The challenges discussed in this chapter are likely to continue to compromise the
meaningful integration of ESD/GCED concepts and competencies into curricula
in Southeast Asia. Key ESD/GCED concepts have in general been accorded
selective and partial interpretations, signalling rhetorical conformity with an
international agenda, while seldom implying any fundamental reorientation of
entrenched, conventional nation-building strategies, or of schooling’s role in
relation to them — the sort of reorientation envisaged in key UNESCO documents
(UNESCO, 2014c; UNESCO, 2015b; UNESCO, 2016c).
In considering ways to improve the state of ESD/GCED, it is important, first, to
acknowledge and reconcile the competing influences that shape educational
priorities across Southeast Asia. This may admittedly produce some degree of
official discomfort, but then promoting attitudes and competencies required
for dealing with difficult issues is central to the vision of ESD/GCED itself. It is
essential to encourage and support Southeast Asian policymakers, curriculum
developers, educators, and students in their efforts to find ways not just to
manage but also embrace disagreement and diversity in the classroom. This is
the kind of transformation of cultures of schooling that Southeast Asia needs
if its peoples are to find sustainable ways of living peaceably in a region of vast
diversity, and of collaborating to address shared environmental, economic and
security challenges.
Rethinking Schooling for the 21 st Century:
The State of Education for Peace, Sustainable Development and Global Citizenship in Asia
135