Every now and again someone in public life likes to pound
the table and declare that the absence of this subject or that subject is a blight
on the Irish education system. Some people think the children should be taught
how to play a musical instrument. Some think it would be something of a miracle
to get the little monsters to read and/or write, to say nothing of asking them
to bang out sonatas on the piano. And so the long day wears on.
The latest to enter the lists is Senator Professor John Crown, who got busy on the Twitter machine over the weekend. The Senator is
concerned about a certain level of scientific ignorance in the general
population, remarking that “high levels of scientific ignorance in a society
are very dangerous.” He went on say that “every person should do science in
school right up to school leaving age,” on the basis that precise analytical
skills will stand to students in their adult lives.
And that’s very laudable, of course. It would be lovely if
people were more scientifically minded. Unfortunately, right now the nation
cannot afford it. We cannot afford it in terms of money but more importantly,
we cannot afford it in terms of time.
If any mathematically based subject should be brought front
and centre in Irish education right now it isn’t science. It is economics.
Last week the sovereign Irish nation allowed the state to
ratify the Treaty on Stability, Coordination and Governance in the Economic and
Monetary Union done at Brussels on the 2nd day of March 2012. All the evidence
is that this was a blind vote on the nation’s behalf.
The nation voted on a Treaty that it didn’t understand, and
that couldn’t be explained to it in the time frame given. The level of economic
literacy needed to understand the arguments about the worth or otherwise of the
Treaty doesn’t exist in the general populace.
What’s going on currently in Europe is extremely complex.
Because of our history, we are brought up with the notion that states are
formed because of nationhood – that no-one can set a boundary on the march of a
nation, as Parnell put it.
But states can be formed for economic benefit too, and that
is what is currently happening in Europe. A common language and culture is fine
in a state, but what really butters the parsnips in a state is a common
currency.
One of the reasons that the Euro failed is because it was
created without the protections that exist for other, “proper” currencies – a
central government and a central bank that regulates the flow of currency. One
of the results of the referendum, of the establishment of the EU Stability
treaty and the Spanish banks sliding slowly and surely to their doom, is that
the European Central Bank is now being built, brick by brick, with the European
Government to follow.
What that means in Ireland is referenda a go-go. Matt Cooper
outlined this position in the Sunday Times and his article makes for
distressing reading. More and more referenda will come down the line and each
one will, by definition, trade sovereignty for economic benefit. And each
referendum will be more and more fraught, for two reasons. The first is because
sovereignty was so hard won in the first place and the second reason is because
people genuinely don’t understand the economics of what’s happening.
One of early reactions to the Treaty vote was to identify a
clear class division in Ireland, between a pro-austerity middle class and an
anti-austerity working class. But is that true? Does the electorate understand
how all this works? Are they sufficiently informed to make a judgment? Do the
people really understand the full implications of austerity, the alternatives
to austerity or the possibility of implementing one of the other?
Chances are they don’t. Economics isn’t taught as a core
subject in Irish schools and it really ought to be. Generations have grown up
and gone into the world without ever fully understanding just how money makes it
go round.
Why is the West richer than the East? The West is richer
than the East because the West is better able to generate money through
borrowing and lending with banks. The East has a religious object to usury –
there is no such problem in the West. Banks create wealth in a capitalist
economy.
Why did the British Empire triumph and the Spanish Empire
fall? The sinking of the Spanish Armada in 1588 certainly,
but also because the British were so much better at trading. All the gold the
Spanish looted from South America became worth less and less, because money is
a measure of worth, and not actual wealth in and of itself.
That’s how the modern world was created, but most people
don’t know it because it’s not taught in school.
It would be lovely if all subjects were taught in school. It
would be lovely if the state could produce a population that saw all forms of
knowledge as having their own particular merit. But in modern Ireland, the
nation is being lost through lack of economic understanding. If it must be a
choice between science and economics, the best bet is to follow the money.
