ROUND TABLE OF INDUSTRIALIZED COUNTRY TRADE UNIONS



Introductory remarks by Fred van Leeuwen, EI General Secretary

Thanks to hosts CTF and BCTF.

Some remarks on our purpose in meeting.

We have considered, since the creation of EI, that it would be important to have opportunities for the leaders of our member organizations in the industrialized countries to meet together occasionally, to share views and the latest information about development in these countries. We all sense that it is more important than ever to have these opportunities, especially in view of the pace of globalization, and its impact on all our countries.

The group of industrialized countries has been defined as these 30 countries in the OECD. But this is not an iron-clad definition. Singapore, for example, is obviously an industrialized country, but is not a member of the OECD. South Africa, Russia and countries like India, Brazil, Chile and China, are industrializing rapidly. While not members of the OECD, they have significant programmes of cooperation with the OECD. They are described as “partner countries”. OECD itself is undergoing a process of rethinking about its future membership, and its future role, under the new Secretary General, Angel Gurria, coming from Mexico, which joined the OECD ten years ago. OECD has become a global meeting place for Ministries of the member and partner countries. I saw a staggering statistic this week. Last year, some 40,000 officials from the Ministries of OECD member and partner countries – including Ministers and departmental heads – participated in OECD meetings. And OECD has built a reputation for comparative research and policy analysis in all sectors of government that is second to none. Gurria proposes that the OECD become as he calls it “the Secretariat for Globalization”.

One sector that has had increasing importance at OECD in recent year is Education. Five years ago, OECD established a separate Directorate on Education. Its annual publication Education at a Glance, containing key education statistics from all OECD and some partner countries, actually gets more media attention around the world than any other OECD publication. And as we all know, PISA – the Programme for International Student Assessment – gets front-page coverage – and controversy – when its reports come out. The next report – for 2006 – is due out in December this year.

EI is already very active at the OECD. We work closely with the Trade Union Advisory Committee (TUAC) and chair TUAC’s Working Group on Education, Training and Employment. Our Research Network follows key OECD research projects and studies. Our Higher Education group is especially interested – and concerned – over work done by OECD in their field.

We have succeeded in opening access to the OECD’s education activities, to the extent that the human resources of the two secretariats have been stretched. During 2006, steps were taken to build networks of EI affiliates related to specific OECD projects, notably PISA, the Teachers Survey and the School Leadership Study, and to encourage more direct affiliate involvement. These moves have been welcomed by the OECD secretariat. Regular information on OECD research activities has been circulated through the EI Research Network. EI and TUAC have now initiated cooperation on a dedicated website that is planned to facilitate EI affiliates’ access to the full range of studies and projects undertaken by OECD in education.

I believe the time has come for us to give consideration to convening an annual meeting of our member organizations in the OECD [and some of the main partner countries]. There may also be some interest in establishing within our international an OECD group, a steering committee, working group with the purpose of developing policy and strategies, providing guidance our work with respect to the OECD, and to the G8 which has started to take a special interest in education as well.

Mobility and Migration

Let me add some remarks on the topics for this meeting. [ Geographical Mobility and Cultural Diversity: How to develop public education? ] First on Mobility and Migration.

18 months ago EI and TUAC proposed to the Chief Executives, i.e. Heads of Education departments, that OECD focus on the issue of mobility and migration as it affects education.

The new Secretary General, Gurria, has proposed that Migration be one of the major “horizontal” projects, involving all the Directorates of the organization, and notably Education, as well as Employment Labour and Social Affairs. We are very glad that Bernard Hugonnier, Deputy Director of Education at the OECD, is here with us in Vancouver to brief us on this project, and to get our input.

Last week we held a conference in London on staff and student mobility in the European Higher Education Area. As a social partner in the Bologna Process we are actively engaged in persuading public authorities and higher education institutions that they develop a proactive mobility policy and remove obstacles to academic staff mobility. Also last week we released a study identifying those obstacles. When we talk about mobility and migration we are talking about many different things. We talk about academics and students moving around in their higher education area in Europe. But we also talk about teachers moving from low income countries to the industrial economies. Here we usually stop speaking of mobility and start using the word migration, which I believe has a less positive sound to it. And we also speak of our migrant students, and the challenges our school systems are facing to give this group a fair chance.

We have evidence from 67 countries on the equity of the outcomes of education systems, drawn from the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). PISA reveals marked differences among countries. Finland and Canada are both high performers but their results are also more equitable than most other countries. Students differ in achievement but not because of their social backgrounds. On the other hand, the results for Australia and Germany reveal substantial inequity: differences in school performance among students reflect marked differences in their social background. For example, disadvantaged students in Australia fall about 1½ years behind their counterparts in Finland. Why?

Migration is one of the hottest and most controversial issues facing our communities today. The issue is being abused for political purposes in virtually every country.

The diversity of the world has now come into each of our national societies, into each of our local communities. A country of immigrants like or host country, Canada, has an advantage in the global community of the 21st century, because they began to confront the challenges of building a multicultural society earlier. They have also recognized the rights and role of the indigenous people who were there before the immigrants,

Some of us come from countries – old Europe as the old Rumsfeld would say - that were historically countries of emigration. Today, the former emigrant countries have to address the same issues of multiculturalism as the countries of historical immigration. So do the former colonial powers – Britain, France and Germany. So do the other industrialized countries – Italy, the Scandinavians, Japan. There is simply no member country of the OECD (except perhaps Iceland) where immigration is not an issue.

The reaction to this reality is sometimes frightening. Anti-immigrant political movements have developed across the OECD countries – from Denmark to Austria to Britain, France and Italy. So-called mainstream political parties are jockeying to recuperate the slogans of the demagogues. Some of us had the dreadful experience of governments playing cynically on anti-immigrant sentiments for electoral gain.

[The demagogues would play on fear and the rejection of those who are different. As educators, we must recognize the richness that comes from embracing human diversity. Vicious cycles of extremism and exclusion, now threaten us not just locally or even nationally, but globally. With slogans dating back to medieval times, but using the technologies of the internet and mobile ‘phones, a deadly conflict has emerged and the world is fearful.

I said earlier that globalization is with us to stay, but the question is, what kind of globalization?]

Many conservative governments are ironically linking policies stated to enhance competitiveness in the global economy with reassertion of nationalism or traditional values. That is the case in Japan, where the Abe government has moved to insert “obligatory patriotism” as a central feature of the Education Law. Amendments of the Education Law stating the goals of education to include “respect for traditions and culture”, and “love of the nation and homeland” are widely seen as preparing the way for similar amendments to the Japanese Constitution. It is the case in one of Europe’s most populous countries, Poland, where the government is reasserting “traditional Polish values” while pressing for changes to make Poland more competitive. It is the case in the United States, where government support for US-based multinational corporations goes hand in hand with building a 400 kilometer fence to keep out Mexicans. It is the case in Australia, where industrial democracy has been uprooted in the name of global competitiveness, by a government that played to narrow chauvinism for electoral purposes by its rejection of asylum seekers.

What is the common picture here?

All these governments seem to use the combined arguments of traditonal values & national patriotism and global competitiveness, to push through policies that serve the short-term interests of their dominant economic groups. This approach is not only immoral, it is unsustainable over time.

[It is the responsibility of education unions worldwide, and of the broader trade union movement, to advocate for a globalization based on equity, social justice and common rather than competing interests, such as the need to act together on climate change. Our responsibility to promote understanding among nations and peoples is not just idealistic pie in the sky. It is vital.]

Our purpose, here and at OECD, is to bring a degree of rational analysis and discussion to bear on this important issue.

The same is true for the other issues to be discussed in the days to come some of which are quite sensitive as well. If I could pick one it would be: Public/Private Partnerships. PPPs or MultiStakeholderPartershipsinEducation (MSPE). Are PPPs a fashionable trend enabling private enterprises to develop new markets, to express their corporate responsibility or is it going to be a permanent feature which we need to take seriously. I believe the latter and I think we need to engage in discussions at OECD level, in the EU, but also in the UN agencies and IFIs. I also believe that simply rejecting these parternships as undermining public education may not be the best strategy. Moreover, there are examples of partnerships that strengthen the public school systems in which they operate and help improve education quality.

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