Coleman, James S. and David Court (1993) University Development in the Third World: The Rockefeller Foundation Experience Oxford: Pergamon Press
INTRODUCTION
p. xv: We are “. . .concerned with such larger issues as the nature of the North-South encounter; the transfer or diffusion of institutions from one culture to another, including their indigenization, adaptation, and ultimate internationalization; and the effects and limits of exogenous interventions on those processes.”
p. xvi: “A second dimension was the changing conception of “development” and of its empirical indicators. What at first seemed so simple, self-evident, and obviously universal became complex, culturally relative and manifestly highly subjective. As the concept was the central operative one in the declared goal of the Foundation and other like actors, its metamorphoses inescapably affected both the self-image of the Foundation and the perspective of others regarding what the objective of the program was.”
Section I: Context and History
CHAPTER ONE: THE INTERNATIONAL SETTING pp. 1-17
“Four relevant dimensions of the setting”
(1) the rapid global diffusion of the modern university;
(2) the changing conceptions of development and its empirical indicators;
(3) the shifting perspectives regarding the relationship between higher education and development; and,
(4) changes in foreign-aid doctrine, priorities, and participants.
Rapid Global Diffusion of the Modern University
· Modern Western colonialism;
· Rise and fall of nationalism;
· Facilitating support of international aid; and,
· Upward strivings and politically irresistible demands of newly mobilized peoples throughout the world.
p. 2: “[T]he university is regarded everywhere as an integral part of the symbolic center of core institutions in a sovereign state in a global state system of legal equals. . . . [I]t is seen in the postcolonial world as the only means for ending educational and cultural dependence.”
p. 3: “[T]he Foundation’s efforts were directed at trying to improve significantly the quality and the developmental capacity of selected existent institutions, some new and some old, and to facilitate adaptation, as appropriate and desired, of imported variants of a “Northern” model to the cultures and requirements of the “Southern” countries in which the programs were established.”
Marshall Plan – 1947-1950s – demonstrated the transformative power of external assistance. But did so in specific environments – industrial, Northern. This became the dominant development model for much of the Western/Northern effort in the world system though few non-Northern countries fit the enviro-type.
Rostow’s Modernization Theory – Stages of Growth and Takeoff
· Positivistic optimism;
· Western ethnocentrism;
· Unilinear determinism;
· Reductionist Economism.
Shift, the end of the 1960s (First Development Decade) to meeting “basic needs” – further refined away from material needs to such conceptions as self-determination, political freedom, national identity, etc.
p. 6: “Dependency theory (“dependencia” as it was originally coined in Latin America) argued that the international system of rich center – poor periphery relationships creates and perpetuates the underdevelopment of Third World countries, which are locked in to a permanent world system of inequality wherein development of any kind for them is impossible.”
Human Capital Theory – 1960s – World Bank – education is an investment in the economic potential of youth. Education affects production, and must be understood as a rational (and thus rationalized) aspect of production.
HCT – education = economic growth = economic development = overall societal development = modernization
Colonialism – and its end in Africa in the late 1950s, early1 960s - led to desire to expand education opportunities – precisely the kinds of opportunities long denied to colonized peoples. University education was part of this. Given lack of development during colonialism, the only actor large enough in scale/scope to bring increased education opportunities was the state – thus nationalism and nationalist attitudes come forth in university expansion/development.
p. 10: “The mounting disillusionment over both the developmental record and the promise of higher education in the Third World was exacerbated by a sort of synergistic negativism from the widespread disenchantment in the industrial Northern countries generated by their own student rebellions and university crises of the late 1960s. Throughout the world universities confronted rapidly eroding esteem and support. The halo and veneration so lavishly and uncritically bestowed upon them everywhere during the previous two decades suddenly evaporated; almost overnight they were perceived no longer as the solution to the problem of development but as a central part of the problem itself.”
Foundation efforts
1913 – Rockefeller – between 1913 and 1950 (Truman’s point Four program in support of international assistance), Rockefeller provided over $100 million in 56 “developing countries” – this is seen as defining the practice of “international assistance.”
1926 – Carnegie – program in support of educational development in British colonial Africa;
1941 – Kellogg – program of fellowships in Latin America
1950 – Ford – Overseas Development Program
United States Agency for International Development
British Inter-University Council for Higher Education Overseas
British Overseas Development Administration (now DfID)
Inter-American Development Bank
Golden era – 1960-1975 – peak year for university assistance was 1965 – 75 universities in 31 countries aided to the tune of $122 in 1965 alone. 72 U.S. universities ran the contracts.
By 1974, aid had been reduced to only 18 universities. Shift was on to support of “basic needs.”
Reasons for turning away from support for universities:
· University strikes, demonstrations, and political upheavals swept the globe and destabilized many governments;
· Growing evidence of unemployment of university graduates in developing countries and an alarming increase in the brain drain of university-level manpower;
· Seeming irrelevance for development of the skills and knowledge university students were receiving;
· Fundamental change in psychology of the situation from the excitement of building something new and experimental to the drudgery of mere institutional ‘steady state” survival;
· Escalating costs of Third World universities and the vision of worse to come as a result of uncontrollable socio-political demands; and,
· The elitist-minded university products, coupled with the reputedly exploitive behavior of those elistes vis-à-vis their own masses.
CHAPTER TWO: EARLY ROOTS AND ANTECEDENTS pp. 19-29
Rockefeller Foundation FOCI:
(1) Industrially less-developed countries;
(2) University institution-building;
(3) Development of intellectual leadership; and,
(4) Advancement and diffusion of the three major disciplines – agriculture; health; and social sciences.
Rockefeller Foundation MODES:
(1) Direct operation with its own professional field staff;
(2) Long-term commitment;
(3) Multi-disciplinarity; and,
(4) Concentration.
International Health Board – established in 1913 (ended in 1951) – timeline of foci - hookworm; yellow fever; malaria; viruses generally.
General Education Board – established in 1928 – natural science and scientific agriculture, and only later social sciences.
China (1920s - Peking Union Medical College) and Brazil (1928-1956 – long-term support and development of medical school of the University of Sao Paulo) were early beneficiaries of Rockefeller largesse.
Mexico - 1943 – agriculture – National College of Agriculture
Re: social sciences – not until the 1950s/1960s did social science support reach beyond North America, Europe, and China.
CHAPTER THREE: GENESIS OF THE PROGRAM pp. 31-41
By 1945, only five grants were international and outside of Europe. All others (18 in total) were Europe-based.
Between 1945 and 1960, focus on China and eastern Europe gave way (due to communist expansion into those regions) to focus on colonial environments and newly emergent states in Africa and elsewhere (India, especially).
The rise of other foundations (esp. FORD FOUNDATION – 1950) in this period, also changed the way in which the Rockefeller Foundation was perceived. No longer the monopolist big-fish-in-a-small-pond, it had to take the efforts of others into account in its programming.
Social sciences – first foray – 1947 into Crete at the invitation of the Greek government. Very short-lived – initial research, report written and submitted – The End.
1951 – Poona, India – Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics – India’s major social science research center of the time.
1957 & 1959 – University of Chile – graduate program in economics, and fledgling Institute of Economics
Efforts were dualistically pro-social science research and pro-applied research. At times, this dualism created programmatic problems.
Humanities Division – pre-1950 focus was in development within the USA re: Russia, China, Japan and Latin America.
Post-1950 Humanities Division opened out to near East, South Asia, and Southeast Asia.
Dean Rusk assumes Presidency of Rockefeller Foundation in 1952 – former Asst. Secretary of State for Asian Affairs – pushed program development in support of “free societies” in Africa, Asia, and Latin America – response to Cold War. By 1957, university development stood at $8.5 million.
1961 – University Development Program (UDP) – holistic, multi-disciplinary approach. Holism necessitated reduced breadth in terms of the number of institutions supported. Norman Buchanan (RockFound’s Social Sciences Director) espoused “disinterested” academic pursuits, i.e. those that did not see activism outside of disciplines as a function of universities. Teaching and research both keyed upon in foundation support.
UDP eventually encompassed institutions in twelve countries: in nine of these countries, the Rockefeller Foundation had already been active prior to 1950. And in all but one, the Foundation had a presence prior to UDP in 1961. Half of the twelve would be in Africa.
The countries: Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Nigeria, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Congo (Zaire), Sudan, Philippines, Thailand, and Indonesia.
