Abstract
This article focuses on the dynamic relationships between the growing importance of lifelong learning (LLL) and consequent devaluation of adult education in national level educational policies, plans and programmes in India. It argues that by adapting the new paradigm of LLL, which is largely driven by marketcentric neoliberal principles, Indian adult education has lost its core and traditional learning ecology as there is a gradual submission to the pursuit of global economic competitiveness. It identifies three main reasons for the submission: (1) the metamorphosis from welfare to market principles in reforming education; (2) blind acceptance and misunderstanding of LLL as an educational and not a political discourse; (3) fragmented reforms in revamping adult education in India in the last decades.
Highlights
The history of learning is as old as the history of humankind, and in India, one of the oldest civilizations in the world, renowned for its culture and scholarship, the philosophy of lifelong learning (LLL) has long been a cherished goal (Dutta, 1986; Bhatia, 2009; Shah, 2009, 2010)
The following section provides a brief recapitulation of adult education (AE) in India, and is followed by a discussion on how funding, focus and attention on AE in India rose in the 1970s and 1980s, gradually reduced more recently
In the post-2000 period, LLL entered into the mainstream policy lexicon when international policy bodies, such as the United Nations Education and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the European Commission, championed the idea with substantial differences in their approaches
Summary
The history of learning is as old as the history of humankind, and in India, one of the oldest civilizations in the world, renowned for its culture and scholarship, the philosophy of lifelong learning (LLL) has long been a cherished goal (Dutta, 1986; Bhatia, 2009; Shah, 2009, 2010). It is no longer limited to any specific field(s) and has appeared as an overarching principle that guides the trajectories of education policies towards economic growth (Field, 2006; Shah 2009, Barros, 2012) This notion is backboned by neoliberal ideologies and governed by market dynamics (Appadurai, 2001; Jarvis, 2008; Dixit, 2009; Mandal, 2015). The following section provides a brief recapitulation of AE in India, and is followed by a discussion on how funding, focus and attention on AE in India rose in the 1970s and 1980s, gradually reduced more recently It shows how recent national policies are withdrawing support from welfare initiatives that used to fund AE much more substantially and why there is a gradual submission of AE to the pursuit of global economic competitiveness. The failures to revamp AE through fragmented, short-lived reforms accelerated the formation of a new LLL, which took a new shape that is largely divorced from the traditional notion of AE
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