In the groves of academe, Hala Fattah

Opinion, July 2003, www.aljazeerah.info

In the groves of academe

Hala Fattah

The Daily Star, 7/31/03

Last month, an international group of Middle East scholars traveled to Baghdad to investigate the situation of university libraries, research centers and cultural-religious sites. Not surprisingly, after 23 years of war and sanctions, our discussions were not confined to the groves of academe.
After nine days of meeting with librarians, university administrators, professors, deans, students, artists and booksellers as well as officials of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), it became evident there was a divide between those responsible for higher education and culture at the CPA and Iraq’s guardians of public education presidents, professors and educators at Baghdad universities and colleges. We concluded that if such issues as the privatization of higher education were not handled with a modicum of restraint and respect for Iraqi traditions, then the divide would become a yawning chasm.
At the end of our trip, we issued a report called Opening the Doors, which was widely distributed on the internet. Among our recommendations were ones that librarians and scholars call for as a matter of course the modernization of university libraries; the organization of a centralized, international body to coordinate library acquisitions and donations; the introduction of internet on college campuses; and initiation of cultural and educational exchanges between Iraqi and Western universities.
We made other recommendations, such as the creation of an ombudsman to mediate between nonstate actors who stored National Library and Archive books in mosques for safekeeping prior to the war and representatives of the emergent Iraqi state, lest there be misunderstandings over ultimate control over these collections. We also sought the reopening of a new national library in a more suitable and symbolic venue than the previous one gutted by fire, namely the historic quarter of the Qushla, the former Ottoman governor’s residence.
But the heart of our report consisted of an investigation of the modalities governing the relationship between the CPA and Iraqi academe. The CPA is represented in this instance by the adviser on education, Andrew Erdmann, and the adviser for culture, Pietro Cordone. Both are faced with an academic system in huge disarray, now consisting at most major Baghdad universities of highly dependent, insecure and troubled faculties and administrations.
Iraqi academics were stunned by the rapidity of American actions. The de-Baathification ruling of June 17 removed many Baathist university professors, deans and presidents. In the two interviews we conducted with Erdmann and Cordone, their emphasis on privatizing universities left us with the impression that a decision had already been taken in this regard, despite the imbalances and chaos it would cause. In our report we called for a less monolithic view of de-Baathification, and a more consistent and just process in which Iraqis would themselves take the lead in dismantling a Baathist apparatus that had distorted the development of universities and colleges.
But in our discussions, privatization was not tackled nearly as much as it could have been. While it is part of the CPA’s philosophy, privatization does not speak to the complexities of Iraqi higher education. The notion of what private education would mean to the fastest-growing population of young adults in the Arab world was not explored in any great detail.
If applied (or misapplied) by ideologues with little regard for the Iraqi context, privatized education could be a disaster. Because of war and sanctions, most Iraqi students are impoverished and rely on antiquated methods of transportation to get to their university. They have little money to buy books (photocopies were treated as gold), and even less places in which to study. Could a radical restructuring of universities along private lines benefit them at all? This seemed hardly likely, since one of the immediate measures required was payment of tuition.
But even if a scholarship system is rapidly set up to entice those most able to complete their education, how many students could it accommodate by September? Privatization is by its very nature selective. It would eliminate many students who would normally have enrolled at public universities. On the other hand, if time is of the essence, as both Iraqis and Americans agree (and the CPA is under pressure to show results), where are the fabled foreign endowments that could bankroll departments and, in Erdmann’s phrase, “float” universities as private agencies? Was promise of aid for education a slogan designed to convince reluctant university administrators, or was it premised on solid assurances of international support?
We found some suggestions bizarre, such as Erdmann’s scenario of enlisting “wealthy Gulf individuals” to create consortiums to fund Iraqi universities, as impractical a notion as any in light of Iraq’s past relations with Gulf states.
These were but some of the ideas the CPA came up with to reorganize Iraqi education. It should reconsider. With all its attendant ills politicized faculty and administration, lack of funds, the absence of recent books or periodicals and an ossification of technological expertise public education in Iraq is still capable of producing graduates for the marketplace. If reformed according to the best examples of state education in the US, it could still serve Iraqi students well and dynamically revitalize Iraqi education. However, if university privatization is to be administered in compliance with the CPA’s vision, regardless of Iraqi views or experience, it will traumatize the higher education system.
Wracked by decades of political manipulation and the cynical abuse of power, Iraqi universities cannot shift gears to accommodate the radical experiments of outsiders albeit those with a mission without losing their justification, and, in the end, their integrity.

Hala Fattah, an independent researcher and historian living in Amman, is author of The Politics of Regional Trade in Iraq, Arabia and the Gulf: 1745-1900. She wrote this commentary for THE DAILY STAR

Earth, a planet hungry for peace

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03).

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03).