The first sine qua non of democratic governance – education — must not be confused with the popular idea of getting someone through a formal system of instruction such as the one contemplated in the 1987 Constitution. Whether it is the elementary or high school, or what passes for "higher (tertiary) education" in this country, Filipinos completing the requisite courses cannot be easily passed of as being truly "educated".
The much-vaunted knowledge, orientations and skills supposedly comprising a Filipino’s formal education have not prevented the rise of a citizenry lacking in scientific knowledge, harboring personalistic concerns and making-do with inadequate technical skills. The main reason for this unfortunate trinity is an intellectual error which fails to realize that effective education builds from within a person rather than imposing from outside bits and pieces of undigested facts, uncomprehended formulas and unexamined affectations.
The Filipino learns science not out of one’s natural curiosity, mathematics and statistics from one’s inner sense of logic, form and probability, history from one’s craving for a national, organic identity, governance from one’s fascination with the need to authoritatively allocate society’s scarce resources and the overall culture – its music, poetry, the other arts and sciences — from an inherent compulsion to discover one’s roots.
Instead, the Filipino mostly learns about these educational concerns because one is in class, enrolled in a course, and one’s formal examinations must be passed. The paper chase towards that most valuable of status-building acquisitions – a diploma – perverts the process of education from within, aborting one’s natural love of knowledge and murdering one’s inherent fascination with discovery.
Being "educated" in this manner, no self-worth develops in the individual. The subject becomes obssessed with an external validation of his/her ego and desperately awaits the approval of others. Unable to make independent decisions, the person becomes an easy accomplice to perceived popular sentiments and joins a chorus whenever it forms. Where, originally, the person might have held a contrary opinion or a different sentiment, the pressure to join a popular cause becomes irresistible and one joins a group not so much because the group is right but because so many are already in the group.
So many of those whose "education" compels them to avoid the responsibilities of freedom and, instead, seek the comforts of bondage wind up with groups that thrive on unexamined causes, unquestionable prejudices and unwavering loyalties. People who are sucked up into these black holes of fanaticism are unable to light up a single ray of reason. Paraphrasing an eminent authority on public opinion, such people become dysfunctional for any enduring democracy because they surrender themselves to "a spiral of silence".
In today’s Philippines, education that liberates the Filipino – a program that truly builds up self-worth and makes it possible for someone to rationally explore the objective needs and resources of a national community — will make it possible for a durable democracy to finally emerge in this part of the world. Any other kind of "education" condemns Filipinos to the ignominy a time warp – a kangkungan of history – where democracy is much praised, lip-serviced and precious little more.
One must thus acknowledge that in the long run, perhaps the most crucial governmental function is exercised by the Department of Education. If this is so, then it is good to have former Senator Raul Roco formally tasked with this sobering responsibility. It is also good that the new Secretary of Education is an honorary woman, for democratic education is an impossible dream without half of humankind being actively involved in its realization.