Hi Rhian,

In relation to Indigenous enrolments, I have to point out that they have risen by some 120 % since 1994. Commencements of Indigenous women have risen by more than 350 %, i.e. in 2013 there were probably four times as many as in 1989. All such data is available on my web-site:

www.firstsources.info

Indigenous graduate numbers have risen ten times since 1990: from around 3,300 in the 1991 census to around 35,000 now. HECS has had not the slightest effect on Indigenous commencements, enrolments or graduations.

Back to topic: Gramsci was of course writing, mostly from prison under Fascism, at a time when it was believed that capitalism had entered its final phase, from which it would have no return. So a 'march through the institutions' was the duty of progressives, to destroy such moribund, but militarily powerful, capitalism from within, by white-anting its institutions, especially its school and social institutions.

It was quite understandable for Gramsci to believe as he did: there seemed to be no alternative in his mind to Fascism but Bolshevism (and it's a tragedy that he thought there was much difference between the two). But capitalism - as Marx noted many times - has an amazing ability to bounce back, so much so that it also is flexible enough to allow progressives well up into its structure. Far enough up to be able to influence much of the policy of a capitalist state, especially social, educational and environmental policy.

Hence, the comments about 'a march through the institutions' are a bit ironic: its what some of us progressives have been doing for decades.

Regards,

Joe

Much of the increased university participation rate since 1980 is due to a combination of factors unrelated to HECS.

One of these is the upgrading of colleges of advanced education to university status. Another is the widespread professionalisation of fields of employment that were once entered from high school, TAFE or a CAE, but now require a full university degree or advanced education diploma. Trades that were once learned on the job now demand a much larger tertiary education component.

Another factor is the explosion in overseas student recruitment, which has been a huge money spinner for a now thoroughly privatized advanced education sector, which indirectly feeds the government coffers.

As with much of the Western world, what has now evolved in Australia is a career system that demands a tertiary degree or diploma as a minimum requirement, but one that must be funded by the student and/or the student's parents. No government is going to upset such a sacred cash cow.

The beauty of this - to the perennial and all-pervasive neo-liberal mindset we all now live under - is that more and more people are being snared into the debt trap at a much earlier age.

Kellie's rallying cry to students to demand free education will go nowhere. The average person under 30 has lived their entire life within a neo-liberal cultural framework that has conditioned them to view debt and 'user-pays' as moral purification against the moral corruption of social(-ist) spending. As everything in our economy is geared to getting people into debt, and keeping them there, no one is going to rebel against that anytime soon - even if they wanted to.

Joe
Thanks for the link. The data make for interesting reading.

Killarney
I agree that many factors besides HECS have driven the trend in student numbers, not all of them desirable. But surely the point is that HECS clearly hasn’t done the harm that its detractors claim it does. Levels of participation in higher education by disadvantaged groups, Aboriginal people and people generally are far higher than pre-HECS, even in St. Gough’s day.

I’ve seen “neoliberalism” blamed for some strange things, but seeking to snare people in a debt trap is a new one. Can you point to a neoliberal who has actually advocated this?

The banking Military Industrial Complex is driving us all into abject poverty and we are arguing about who gets the crumbs.

The solution is to get back to Govt owned banks and we can create our own money for infrastructure and education debt free.

Money represents our toil and costs nothing to produce, so why is there always a shortage of this simple medium of exchange?

Rhian

‘Can you point to a neoliberal who has actually advocated this?’

It’s a bit hard to ‘point to’ a neoliberal, as neoliberalism doesn’t manifest itself as a ‘person’. It’s a philosophy that drives the current system of global power, just as capitalism drove the industrial era and feudalism drove the medieval period. All these systems of power maintain a ‘debt’ contract in one form or another, in order to keep the masses under control.

‘But surely the point is that HECS clearly hasn’t done the harm that its detractors claim it does.’

This is more an issue of moral philosophy. In my opinion, a system that saddles young people with a debt of tens of thousands of dollars, before they have even started to make their way in life is immensely harmful. I know many people in their thirties and forties, who are still paying off HECS debts.

Killarney

“Free” education isn’t “free”, it’s paid for by taxpayers, most of whom will not have the career and earnings opportunities that graduates enjoy.

If neoliberalism is “a philosophy that drives the current system of global power”, I would expect you to be able point to one of its philosophers.

I don’t deny that elites and those who exercise power develop ideologies that justify their actions – Rome’s pax Romana, the British empire’s “white man’s burden” and American exceptionalism spring to mind. But these were/are all coherent and articulated philosophies. It would have been be easy to find someone who said “I believe the British empire is good for its subjects because …” You might disagree with them, but that’s a different issue.

You can’t point to anyone who argues that user-pays is “moral purification against the moral corruption of social(-ist) spending” or that the purpose of the economy is to put people into debt, and keep them there. They don’t exist.

At best, we’re back in the Marxist/Gramsci territory of false consciousness – people don’t really understand what they believe and why. We’re mental puppets of sinister forces. The problem with this is that it is deeply elitist and insulting (you presume to know the basis of my beliefs better than I do). It is also unfalsifiable and irrefutable. How can I prove to you that my support of HECS is based on a belief it is fair and efficient, and not because I want people to be permanently burdened with debt? How can you prove to me my beliefs are really based on acceptance of the dominant neoliberal paradigm of controlling the masses through debt, which to my mind seems preposterous? Appeal to motives can also be used to evade engagement with the substance of your opponents’ argument.

In my observation, “neoliberal” is a term of abuse used by the left to describe social and economic policies they disagree with, overlaid with assumptions about the reasons for advocating those policies that bear little relationship to the actual motives of those who propose them