The first point I wish to make, right from the outset, is what actually underpins the claim of my view of the subject under consideration:  the specificity of Mauritius as a former important French colony, a previous British possession and an independent republican State which, inter alia, is part of the Commonwealth in its own right.

In a historical perspective, it is relevant to recall the multifarious implications of the first two factors. Accordingly, as an officially Catholic island, even after its conquest by the British, Mauritius received at the level of policy a treatment analogical to Ireland and “some other islands in the West Indies recently transferred to England from the crowns of France and Spain and therefore predominantly Catholic”, a significant contemporary diplomatic phrase quoted by A.C. Kalla (2002) (4). Grey, in a dispatch dated 5th July 1835, informed Governor Nicolay on the Imperial policy regarding Mauritius where the “agency of missionary societies was not available to the full extent required” that grants in aid of local contributions towards the erection of schools were to be conducted on the principles of the ‘British and Foreign School Society’ (for Presbyterians and other Dissenters) and the National Board of Ireland (for Catholics). The British colonial authorities took into account this quintessential aspect of the former Isle de France which had shared close developmental links with Bourbon and adjacent formerly French-owned territories. Prior to the British conquest,  a handful of Lazarist priests  and private individuals had tried to cater to the “instructional” needs of both slaves and free Franciliens  who  could not afford to travel to France to receive quality metropolitan education, such as was available at the time. Following the British take-over, it took some time for “policies” to shape up: the order of the day was to experiment as best one could with whatever means one had  at one’s disposal and in the light of changing economic, political and social circumstances. Dissenters, Anglicans, Catholics and others were active in the field.  Apart from Lebrun’s interventions and the Church of England’s attempts to minister to the educational needs of one and all, the De La Salle or Christian Brothers and other female religious who had been closely involved in the education of poor and other  children (those of former slaves and free citizens) on our sister island of La Réunion, were called in by Father Laval and the Roman Catholic Church to till a field at a time when State intervention was slow to come and the more zealous among the British tried somewhat to  proselytise and anglicise their Mauritian subjects through  government- run schools (G.L.Easton, 1997 & 2009) (5). In England, the Elementary Education Act which aimed at providing education free of charge to poor children was passed as late as 1870 in France, a decade later and closer to us, in La Réunion, things did not significantly improve until 1946 (R.Lucas, 2006) (6).  Of course, it is essential that all along we bear in mind the facts and stark reality of Western elitist and popular education history in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, and we don’t import present-day concepts into our study of the past, thereby indulging in anachronistic extrapolations and what the French call “le présentisme”. There is a need to tread cautiously.

Thus I posit that there is a duality or inherent logic to reckon with. Viewed from this angle, centripetal and centrifugal elements unfold as marked characteristic features of the Mauritian educational landscape. They are patterned on former metropolitan models or poles: the French Revolution/English educational history scramble for souls (yesterday)/scramble for votes (today) the masses/the elite laissez-faire economics and voluntaryism/State half-hearted involvement in education working class/middle class/upper class stakes. These obviously include indigenous variants which are related to ethnicity, race, factionalism, creed, culture, and gender. A clear-eyed observer cannot miss this interplay or continuum between the past and the present.  Professor S. Ball’s  arguments (2010)  that class inequalities in English education are  almost as stark now as they were in the Victorian era, with faith schools now primarily for the middle class, state or community schools increasingly for the working class, and private and public schools kept as the preserve of the upper class, can be  Illuminating (7). In addition, instances of polarisation stemming from a local/global variant of culture wars such as those which prevail in the United States are ever present, as hinted in S. Ng Tat Chung’s recent publication (2010) (8).

Broader cultural dynamics

We need therefore to broaden our perspectives so as to understand the broader cultural dynamics in education history. We have to steer away from a linear, chronology bound, narrow-minded approach and ideological stances, be they overt or hidden. Indeed a welcomed shift from narrative/descriptive substantive accounts to critical and theoretically informed analysis of policy, thus hopefully building up a body of work over time which would constitute a theoretical, disciplinary approach to policy analysis in education (9). This would imply exposing contemporary discourses and slogans, and adopting the method of critical sociology in “unmasking” the contradictions between public goals, values and mission statements of institutions and what happens in reality.

Two illustrations of this are: D. Gilliborn (2010) applying Critical Race Theory (CRT) and studying the Intersectionality of class, race and gender and Convergence Interest (10), and G. Whitty (2001) arguing that social inclusion policies need to address a variety of forms of middle-class self-exclusion from mainstream public provision as well as working-class social exclusion, concluding that education policy needs to be located within a broader social policy framework. Hence a reminder to research “up” and “down” (11).

A good case in point is informal education, as complementary to or filling the place of formal schooling. Father Michel’s seminal book ‘Les auxiliaires laïcs du Père Laval’ and the ongoing reconstruction of the contribution of catechists/ lay Catholics and close collaborators of Father Laval and his successors, as well as sources on Reverend Lebrun’s work and informal agencies of popular education: the Arya Samaj and cognate deeper, less visible grassroots phenomena comparable to English/French/otherwise Workmen’s Institutes, Co-operative and other religious, cultural, social and political movements over the last two centuries, are surely worth identifying and tapping. An enterprise which recalls P. Laslett’s (1965) challenging book: ‘The World we have lost’ (12).

Two decades ago (1990), in an article dealing with the immediate impact of the French Revolution on late 18th and early 19th century education in Mauritius, I suggested a similar strategy as a more enlightening line worth taking up. I wrote:  “Tenter de saisir l’interaction entre la Révolution française et l’éducation dans son sens le plus large possible équivaut à ne pas se confiner à  l’étude des structures physiques, institutionnelles, mais à prendre en compte les idées, les mentalités, les comportements, l’ambiance du moment, les rapports individuels ou intergroupes à des niveaux difficiles à mesurer à l’aune empirique.” (13)

Also to better understand recurring themes of resistance, conflict and power struggle in pre and post-independent Mauritius in the education arena, comparative approaches are likely to shed light, for instance, on the stand taken by the pressure group known as L’Union Catholique, which was so influential in the latter part of the 19th and the first half of last century as well as on the internal dynamics of Roman Catholicism, both here and abroad. Kit Elliott’s study “Between two worlds:  the Catholic educational dilemma in 1944” in the English context focuses on changes brought about by shifting marriage patterns and gender roles as well as challenges to traditional sexual ethics alongside increasing social mobility which further disrupted the parish communities around which Catholic life had been built (14). Catholic educational thinking before 1940 was in many ways dominated by unease concerning the threat to the devout Catholic nuclear family and therefore to the parish which nourished and protected it.

Significantly, Elliott highlights a slogan commonly used by English and Welsh Catholics in their campaigns to protect their schools before and after the Butler Education Act of 1944: ‘without the schools no Church’. His study sets out to discover why this belief was held and what the implications were for educational development as far as this community was concerned. He writes: “Schools have a considerable historical significance for Catholics who cherish their archives and offer a wide range of resources upon which the historian can call. This history is commonly a reflection of its relationship with the British state. The 1944 Education Act has been one of the defining events within that relationship. At that point the British government established the legislative context within which the Catholic school system has since developed. The State also has its history, and its relationships with the Catholic Church have frequently been dominated by its financial partnership in Catholic education and its supervision by the national inspectorate of Catholic schools. The National Archive thus offers a useful external view of the working of the Catholic education system.” He then concludes that the establishment of a national system of Catholic schools in the 19th century can be seen as a successful response to the harsh economic, social and political realities facing a community vulnerable because of its poverty and its ethnic origins, and he sees the social fluidity following the First World War as threatening this success.  This case study is likely to inform the whole question of educational partnership in our local context. The spin-offs and shackles of Mauritian educational legislation in the 1950s, 1970s and up to the present day did not leave our Catholic fellow countrymen –or, to put it bluntly, Creoles for that matter- indifferent or resigned. The ripples can still be seen and felt. Yet another redefining process, albeit under different climes but not at all generically unrelated, is astir.

Researching is problematising !

What’s researching all about, if not problematising? Indeed it’s trying to come to grips with what is apparently inconsistent and paradoxical. In sum, it is acknowledging complexity along with change and continuity hence the relevance of poststructuralist approaches and an awareness of the postmodernist views of J.Habermas (1987), A. Giddens (1991), D. La Capra (1983 & 2004), and F.R. Ankersmith (1989), e.g., and the ongoing debate on the reliability/ pertinence of history as a discipline as pinpointed by G.McCulloch (2005 &  2007) (15). D. Lawton and P. Gordon (2002), as seasoned education historians, view history as a rational, useful and optimistic exercise.

At an earlier point in this Paper I mentioned duality and inherent logic. In a piece of collaborative work R. Lucas of the UDLR and I undertook for a mini-conference of the SACHES (Southern African Comparative and History of Education Society) in 2005, we addressed this issue drawing on both sociology and history and highlighting those inherent mechanisms: “ces logiques inhérentes aux modèles éducatifs par rapport à la colonisation et ses conséquences.”(16) Our aim was to provide a framework to expose and account for those features of schooling history shared by our two countries at a particular point in time. Naturally, since Mauritius became a British colony and La Reunion stayed French, our educational history took a divergent course.

Two more points should be made. We should go on exploring  standard or what I call ‘matricial’ accounts (the French expression that comes to my mind is ‘récits matriciels’) of European, African, Asian and American historical experience in education, not just formal schooling but the broader lifelong and intergenerational process, gathering the ‘bits’, refining them,  turning them into coherent  wholes, and finally enhancing our conceptual framework. R. Lucas (2006) has given us such a model in his “Bourbon à l’ école, 1815-1846” (17). He has drawn on well-established names in the field: E.Durkheim, R.Chartier, M.M. Compère, D.Julia, W.Frijhoff…Yet it’s important to get one’s facts right by probing sources and mapping out the broader picture on the basis of the existing literature.

Likewise, A.C.Kalla’s article ‘Obstacles to the provision of education to slaves in Mauritius, 1830-1845’  and his related research on educational provision for Indian immigrants’ children take us back to the abiding issues in  English popular education history (J.Lawson & H.Silver, 1973) (18). Essential for this purpose is a sense of context and what is at stake. In charting the MICO Charity Schools episode and the application of the Bell and Lancastrian model here, A.C.Kalla (2002) states that the internecine quarrels among the denominations did not foster the development of an education system catering for the former slaves. (19) Interestingly, more or less the same pattern can be discerned concerning the modalities of educational provision for Indian children in late 19th and early 20th century. Issues which cropped up relate to the most appropriate medium of instruction, the purpose of education, its immediate usefulness to the island’s economy, overriding down-to-earth mundane and pragmatic concerns…

The way ahead for us

As committed educators blessed with the benefit of hindsight, we have no other choice than to reject the cultural relativism and nihilisms of the more extreme postmodernists. Inspiration can be sought from the Frankfurt School which comprises sociologists, psychologists and philosophers like Erich Frömm and Jurgen Habermas. Appositely we can also return to Emile Durkheim and consider having a try at the tools he has left us. They are still applicable to the diachronic and/or synchronic study of our postcolonial societies, as Professor R. Lucas has brilliantly demonstrated.

Postmodernism logically leaves no room for education in the normal meaning of the word: education implies a planned, purposive rational process, but planning, purpose and rationality have no place in the visions of the more extreme positivists. Educators are likely to be more attracted to other visions of the future such as those of Habermas and Giddens. On this count we cannot but agree with the argument of Lawton and Gordon (2002), who, even so, see educators as having to plan for the future without knowing what it will be.(20) That is why certain principles of education and living in society are essential. Aristotle is reported to have said that no human being could live without other human beings: only a god or beast could live alone. We are thus driven back to considering education about society and for society as the first priority, actually more important than education for work.

In the final analysis, while guarding ourselves against the naïve optimisms of the Enlightenment we can be led to believe that 21st century education will be a fulfilment of some Enlightenment ideas about education, as refined by the 19th and 20th century experiences.

(Final version of a Paper presented by the author at a workshop on Monday 11 October 2010 at the seat of the Truth and Justice Commission, in the context of its ongoing “Education Project Programme”)

References
1. Carr, E.H. (1964) What is History? (London, Penguin Books)
2. Black,J. and Macraild,D.M. (1997) Studying History (London, Macmillan)
3. Tosh,J. (1984 & 1991) The Pursuit of History  (London and New York, Longman)
4. Kalla, A.C. (2002) ‘Obstacles to the provision of education to slaves in Mauritius 1830-1845’, in Chan Low,J. et al. eds.- Actes du Colloque ‘ l’esclavage et ses séquelles’ , Municipalité de Port- Louis et Univ. de Maurice,oct.1998 (Réduit, Presses de l’Université de Maurice), 179-190
5. Easton, G.L. (1997) ‘L’Institut des Frères des écoles chrétiennes: un bref rappel de ses origines’, in The Marian, St. Mary’s College magazine ibid. (2009) “For the greater glory of God in the service of Man”: from Rathfarnham Loreto House (Ireland) to Port Louis (Mauritius), in Journal of Mauritian Studies(MGI) , special issue on  Voyages ,Spaces and Encounters, 1, 40-47
6. Lucas, R.(2006) Bourbon à l’école 1815-1946 (Saint André, Océan Editions)
7. Ball,S. (2010) Routledge Interview with Professor Stephen Ball, Editor of Journal  of Education Policy
8. Ng Tat Chung, S. (2010) Dans les coulisses de l’éducation 1987-2010 (Riche Terre, Alfran Co. Ltd.)
9. Ball, S., op.cit.
10. Gillborn,D. (2010) ‘The White Working  Class, Racism and Respectability: Victims, Degenerates and Interest Convergence’ , British Journal of Educational  Studies, 58:1,3-25 
11. Whitty, G. (2001) ‘Education, social class and social exclusion’, Journal of Education Policy, 16:4,287-295
12. Laslett,P. (1965) The World we have lost (London)
13. Easton,G.L. (1990) ‘La Révolution française et l’éducation: problèmes et perspectives’, in Bissoondoyal,U.& Sibartie,A.eds.-Actes du Colloque ‘L’Ile Maurice et la Révolution française’,MGI, aoüt 1989 (Moka, Presses du MGI),248-257
14. Elliott, Kit (2004) ‘Between two worlds: the Catholic educational dilemma in 1944’,History of Education,33:6,661-682
15. Habermas, J. (1987) The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity: Twelve Lectures (Cambridge, Polity Press) Giddens,A. (1991) Modernity and Self-Identity (Cambridge, Polity Press) La Capra,D. (1983 & 2004) Rethinking Intellectual History: Texts, Contexts, Language (Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press)  and  ‘Tropisms of Intellectual History’, Rethinking History,8:4,499-529 Ankersmith, F.R. (1989) ‘Historiography and postmodernism’, History and Theory,28,1989 McCulloch, G. (2007) ‘Forty years on: Presidential address to the History of Education Society, London, 4 November 2006’, History of Education,36:1,1-15 ibid. ed. (2005) The RoutledgeFalmer Reader in History of Education (London and New York, Routledge)
16. Easton, G.L. & Lucas, R. (2005) ‘L’histoire de l’éducation à Maurice: situation et enjeux’, in SACHES Online Review
17. Lucas, R., op.cit.
18. Lawson, J. & Silver, H. (1973) A Social History of Education in England (London, Methuen & Co Ltd.)
19. Kalla, A.C., op.cit.
20. Lawton, D. & Gordon, P. (2002) A History of Western Educational Ideas (London and Portland, Woburn Press)

George Lewis Easton