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By VELIA GOVAERE -  Professor UNED

Means do not always achieve the goals they pursue, and it is not uncommon for them to accomplish exactly the opposite. The contradiction between the objectives sought by politics and the results obtained has accompanied history. Philosophers have resigned themselves to this paradox as part of the human condition, without offering explanations. It was described by Giambattista Vico, but coined by Wilhelm Wundt as "heterogenesis". It is the word of the day. For it accurately describes the contrast between the pretensions of the United States as a hegemonic power and the Gordian knot in which it finds itself.

If the word "vision" usually refers to a road map towards a desirable destination, nothing exemplifies misguided foresight better than Clinton's speech on March 3, 2000, urging the US Congress to support China's accession to the WTO, which will occur at the Doha round a year later.

"I find it ironical," Clinton exclaimed, "that so many Americans fear the global impact of a powerful China in the 21st century" (Clinton's words). As I reread his words, I wonder how many times the former president must have beaten his chest. He was mocking those who saw the significance of awakening a dragon of such breath. It is not for nothing that in the United States they say "let sleeping dogs lie". Perhaps that saying was not known in Arkansas.

His enthusiasm was dazzling. According to him, he was opening a multilateralism only for his own benefit. With aplomb he then asserted "This agreement is a one-way street: it requires China to open its market (...) to our products and services to an unprecedented extent." What would Deng Xiaoping have thought if he had heard him?

Clinton's innocent enthusiasm did not have the benefit of ignorance. It had been almost thirty years since Nixon and Kissinger's historic visit to Beijing in 1972. The United States had already experienced 20 years of economic opening with China, which was flooding the U.S. market with consumer products, importing machinery and attracting entire industries to relocate there.

There was every reason to understand that the United States was not the only player on the chessboard. That is why Clinton's words ring hollow when he said: ·"... if you believe in a future of greater openness and freedom for the Chinese people, if you believe in a future of greater prosperity for the American people, if you believe in a future of peace and security for Asia and the world, then you should support this agreement" (NYT, 3/9/2000).

It does not take much argument to demonstrate heterogenesis here. So confesses Jake Sullivan at the Brookings Institution, April 27, 2023, in his speech on renewing U.S. economic leadership. The White House deployed him, on its web page, as security advisor and close collaborator of Joe Biden. Hence the transcendence of his criteria.

Sullivan's most decisive phrase is simple: "...we have had to revise some old assumptions". Few words, but no small thing. He deconstructs the foundations of neoliberal orthodoxy and points out the pernicious effects it has had on the domestic economy and on the relative weakening of US commercial hegemony.

He explicitly refers to the pillars of the Washington Consensus: the directive force of markets, the sophistry of the theory of wealth spillovers to the disadvantaged sectors, the damage of indiscriminate openness and the misallocation of economic growth as an end in itself.

And so explicit are his criticisms that he has no qualms about writing the epitaph of the hegemonic paradigm with which neoliberalism has destroyed industries, weakened countries, accentuated territorial gaps, diminished social programs, aggravated inequality and cracked political cohesion and representativeness. It is a requiem. Sullivan is already talking about the need for a new consensus.

The first victim of neoliberalism was public investment. All the ideas advocating tax cuts, deregulation and privatization were aimed at undermining public management, as Sullivan acknowledges: "...in the name of oversimplified market efficiency, entire supply chains of strategic goods - along with the industries and jobs that manufactured them - were moved offshore". Indeed, if Clinton was happy with a trade liberalization to China that would help export goods to the United States, Sullivan notes that jobs and industrial capacity were also exported. With industries threatening to leave, the bargaining power of their unions was weakened. There were thirty years of falling real incomes for workers. According to Richter (WEF, 12/4/2019), in 2019, workers with barely a bachelor's degree earned 3% less than 40 years ago. Those without a bachelor's degree earned 10% less than in 1979. And still there is amazement at the Rust Belt's fury and that such inequity generates chaos and national division!

There was tremendous economic growth. That is true, but it is no consolation. It was the unbridled and unregulated growth of finance and the stock market that made "...the rich do better than ever." The prevailing assumption was that any growth was good. The assumption was that if you grew in one sector, you would end up "spilling over" to others. Sullivan accepts that that premise was also unfulfilled promise, "...American manufacturing communities collapsed as leading-edge industries moved to metropolitan areas."

Sullivan understands that inequality has a thousand roots, but his account accepts, for the first time, that the key to inequality and the persistence of poverty is rooted in "...decades of trickle-down economic policies, as well as regressive tax cuts, deep cuts in public investment, uncontrolled corporate concentration and active measures to undermine the labor movement."

Sullivan would seem to represent a collective mea culpa and that would be laudable. Perhaps it is, but his vision, however official it may be on the Biden Administration, faces a dual process: deconstructing a still-dominant consensus and building a still-nascent one. One still feeds the interests of the ruling elites and the other still has no claws. He accepts it. It remains to be seen what fate awaits Sullivan's revisionist confessions.

Presentación del artículo:
ACIERTOS Y FALENCIAS DEL SISTEMA DE EDUCACIÓN DIGITAL CEIBAL EN URUGUAY E IMPLICACIONES PARA COSTA RICA

MBA. Hellen Ruiz Hidalgo
Comunicadora Estratégica // (OCEX-UNED)
Vicerrectoría de Investigación

La suspensión de clases durante la pandemia de la COVID-19 expuso la relevancia, para docentes y estudiantes, de poseer computadoras y tener conexión a internet. En Costa Rica, hubo falta de previsión de esa necesidad, con graves consecuencias. Este ensayo expone el Plan de Conectividad Educativa de Informática Básica para el Aprendizaje en Línea de Uruguay (Plan Ceibal, ahora Ceibal). Creado en el 2007, consistió en proveer conectividad universal de hogares y centros docentes a internet, distribución masiva de computadoras, construcción de sistemas pedagógicos y capacitación docente con recursos didácticos en línea. Eso creó un paradigma político-educativo sistémico de gran resiliencia, de contraste positivo con el resto del mundo, durante la pandemia.

Con 98% de conectividad de docentes y alumnos, Uruguay sostuvo su sistema de educación pública funcionando en la virtualidad. También se incluyen las observaciones críticas de estudios académicos que apuntan a la limitación de sus impactos, como resultado de reducida apropiación gremial del Plan Ceibal, lo que derivó en baja motivación docente en utilizar sus recursos.

Se reseñan los cambios concretados, en respuesta a las críticas y, con su objetivo de inclusión alcanzado, cómo se concentra ahora en innovación educativa. Se contrasta la política educativa digital uruguaya con la de Costa Rica y se analizan los elementos decisivos a tener en cuenta para ser asumido como mejor práctica en Costa Rica.

La forma en que Uruguay ha implementado ese paradigma es el contenido de este artículo publicado en la Revista Electrónica Calidad en la Educación Superior (CAES) de la UNED, que compartimos a continuación (descarga artículo completo). Adicionalmente, le compartimos el enlace de la revista (CAES) para visualizar su contenido completo. En esta edición se incluyen nueve artículos en la edición ordinaria y siete artículos en la edición especial. Ambas ediciones cuentan con 16 artículos con autores procedentes de universidades de seis países tales como: México, Brasil, España, Canadá, Argentina y Costa Rica. Los cuales abordan diferentes temáticas relacionadas con la calidad en las Instituciones de Educación Superior (descarga revista completa)

REVISTA ELECTRÓNICA CALIDAD EN LA EDUCACIÓN SUPERIOR ISSN: 1659-4703, VOL.14(1) ENERO – MAYO, 2023: 136 – 168.

Versión en inglés



POR VELIA GOVAERE VICARIOLI

No siempre los medios consiguen los fines que persiguen y no es infrecuente que logren exactamente lo contrario. La contradicción entre objetivos perseguidos por la política y resultados obtenidos ha acompañado la historia. Los filósofos se han resignado a constatar esa paradoja sin ofrecer explicaciones, como parte de la condición humana. La describió Giambattista Vico, pero la acuñó Wilhelm Wundt como “heterogénesis”. Es la palabra del día. Describe con exactitud el contraste entre las pretensiones de los Estados Unidos como potencia hegemónica y el nudo gordiano en que se encuentra.

Si con la palabra “visión” se suele referir a un mapa de ruta para llegar a un destino deseable, nada ejemplifica mejor una errónea capacidad de anticipación que el discurso de Clinton del 3 de marzo del 2000, instando al Congreso estadounidense a apoyar la adhesión de China a la OMC, que ocurrirá en ronda Doha, un año después.

“Me parece irónico —peroraba Clinton— que tantos estadounidenses teman el impacto global de una China poderosa en el siglo XXI”. Mientras releo sus palabras, me pregunto cuántas veces se habrá el expresidente golpeado el pecho. Se burlaba entonces de quienes veían la trascendencia de despertar un dragón de semejante aliento. No en vano se dice en Estados Unidos “let sleeping dogs lie”. Tal vez ese dicho no se conocía en Arkansas.

Accese el artículo completo en:

https://www.nacion.com/opinion/columnistas/las-confesiones-de-sullivan/P4DCWYXWWJBGFPH3LEMXP2MFYI/story/?outputType=amp-type

Artículo publicado en Periódico La Nación, 25 de mayo 2023.
La autora es investigadora de OCEX y catedrática de la UNED