Abstract
It is currently fashionable to declare Third World development ideology to be at an end, but conditions in those countries are worsening and education appears ineffective in preventing that. Education has been seen as the strategy to bring countries out of underdevelopment, social inequality and injustice. In fact, often by promoting professional interest groups, it may have the opposite effect. But official rhetoric in countries like India, Venezuela, Nigeria, Brazil, Argentina, Peru and Mexico, continues to insist that education is the way to promote development. In Venezuela the chance was there but it has been wasted. In addition to the old issues in education and development, such as economic growth and the organisation of education, there are new issues of debt, drugs, corruption and violence. Governments are reducing educational expenditure. The system suffers from deprivation of academic freedom, or misguided populist policies, from anti-intellectualism and administrative corruption. As sociologists we need better theory and research to make our voices heard.
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