Alienation, autonomy, and ideology
I’ve put my focus for the year in 2021 on issues in the corporate world. I’ve focused in particular on the role the business world plays in our lives. But, so far, my focus has (mostly) stayed away from education. Let’s change that a bit with a brief discussion of EdTech.
The education system relates to the tech world in lots of ways. I’ll sum this up with a quote from Noam Chomsky.
I read an article recently in Catalyst on the phenomenon of ‘NGOism.’ Here’s the basic idea: NGOs and other non-profit organizations tend to increase the influence of the private sector on social welfare systems. In addition, the internal logic of NGO orgs (501c3 status, funding methods, et al.) prevent them from seriously challenging the capitalist system. It also pushes them toward endorsing technocratic approaches to problems and prevents them from treating politics as the playing out of conflicts over class interests.
There’s not a lot here that’s new. NGOism sounds pretty familiar. People have criticized them many times along these linkes. And we know some of the other problems related to NGOism: low pay in the sector, and so on.
But after reading the article, I thought about local implications. Here’s one way NGOism plays out in my city. I serve on our city Housing and Community Development Commission. Among other tasks, we award lots of money to NGOs and non-profits.
Sometimes I’m a bit fixated on the distinction between social democracy and socialism (or socialist democracy). And I approach the topic from many angles. We might tell one from the other in terms of how they build programs, how (and whether) they oppose capitalism, who makes up their base, how (and whether) they engage in class struggle, and whether morality drives their politics. And we even find that language (and/or inflation thereof) plays a role.
Furthermore, this stands out as no mere academic debate. It drives movement and electoral strategy, as well as how leftist orgs grow.
A book I was just reading reminded me of another approach to it. That approach concerns creativity, democracy, and innovation. Let’s take a look.
Personally, I’m in full summer mode and ready to do some summer reading! So, here’s a list of books I’m tackling here in the middle of the summer.
What are you reading these days?
In the last few years, ‘liberal white women’ emerged as a common point of departure for very different sorts of politics. Some of those politics connect to the far right. But I’ll set those politics aside. Here, in this post, I’m interested in two narratives about liberal white women that appear on the left and center-left.
I’ll argue these two narratives share more in common than many think.
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