The US and the world economy are now into the fourth year of what many consider the greatest economic crisis in history. Economic crises inevitably reach a point where they pass over into political crises. The form the crisis takes today is the overall re-organization of government to make it the open agent of corporations.
The US state is actively intervening to reorganize the branches of the economy. The federal government intervened to reorganize auto to benefit corporations and the banks. It regularly intervenes in the financial industry to save banks with public money. It is intervening in health care to guarantee the profits of the insurance and pharmaceutical companies that control it. Reorganizing the government is an objective necessity that is driven by the economic collapse.
Government is also intervening in public education at every level. Bush’s No Child Left Behind, Obama’s Race To The Top, and the national effort for a Common Core Curricula represent federal efforts to organize and facilitate the further privatization of public schools.
However, in the U.S. public education is organized and delivered principally through state and local government. There are numerous legal statutes at the state and local level that still protect the public and guarantee its interest. Governments today are organizing massive legal changes to eliminate their responsibility to deliver equal, quality public education.
The book “Tough Choices in Tough Times,” financed partially by Bill Gates and issued in 2006, is the corporate manifesto for privatization. It calls for eliminating public control of the schools and replacing public schools with “contract schools.” Like charter schools on steroids, contract schools replace government responsibility to the public with commercial contracts.
The California State Education Code states, “It is the intent of the Legislature that each resident of California who has the capacity and motivation to benefit from higher education should have the opportunity to enroll in an institution of higher learning.” (Section 66201.)
The cutbacks described above border on illegality based on this legal standard. Other promises to guarantee the rights of the public are embodied in the various mission statements of public universities and other legal documents.
These changes all demand the legal restructuring and reorganization of government. This massive process is taking place openly and secretly, legally and illegally, broadly and incrementally, statewide and locally. The working class which makes up 99% of the public, and who depend on higher education in order to feed their families, has no choice but to intervene in the reorganization of government to protect and expand their interests. You can bet, however, that capitalism is not about to negotiate political power.
The 99% has no choice but to embrace the politics of class and transformation, of fighting forward to a new system, of fighting with a positive vision of a new society. We have long known that it is impossible to rally people to a negative vision, of always being against something, instead of being for something.
A political attack cannot be defeated without new politics of class, recognizing and aimed at political power. Government and politicians at every level must be held to their legal responsibility to maintain and expand the interests of the public. The power of the people over public education must be expanded based on a new manifesto to guarantee education for all in the Post-Industrial Era.
