Decolonisation - What does it really mean, and are universities actually doing it?
The Current State of “Decolonisation”
In the academic sector (and further afield) there has been a lot of talk about “decolonisation” lately. Let’s see what a few institutions say about it:
University of Leeds: “The University of Leeds’ decolonising framework aims to helps students and staff question issues of history, power and the origins of the knowledge taught.”[1]
University of York: “Decolonising and diversifying the curriculum aims to reflect wider global and historical perspectives through a process of questioning sources of knowledge, theories and intellectual traditions, identifying how knowledge production can reproduce power hierarchies and how new perspectives can emerge from sustained engagement in dialogue and discussion around this.“ [2,3]
These are just 2 UK universities I have an interest in (I work at Leeds and York is well known for advancing decolonisation initiatives), but you can search for “Decolonisation AND University of …” with whatever university you like and I’m sure something will come up.
Decolonisation is interesting to me because it represents something I truly want: global economic equity, cultural exchange, and dynamic migration across borders and between countries. However, because I’m really quite invested in the idea, hypocrisy and double speak cut a little deeper than they usually would. You might notice that none of the universities really mention any of these things, except in passing. York, admirably, notes the connection to “hierarchies” and “power dynamics”[2], but these phrases are left generic and undefined. This is because without explicit reference to the socio-economic and political structures in place around the world, we cannot properly analyse global, institutional power dynamics. It is here that current decolonisation initiatives miss the mark, and as such in my opinion, should not be called decolonisation initiatives. Let’s investigate why.
What is Colonisation / Decolonisation
Straight away, I will say that colonisation / decolonisation has very little to do with education, and as such, “decolonising the education” is a little bit of a misnomer (although the intent behind it is admirable). Consider the period of colonisation usually refered to in these discussions: that of European colonisation of the Americas. Historically speaking, Western powers (beginning with Spain) funded expeditions to search for new lands…and new resources. These lands were found and claimed not in the name of the individuals who found them, but rather on behalf of the countries themselves. It is the countries and their governments that created policies to incentivise colonisation, extraction of resources, and domination and oppresion of existing native peoples[4]. Note that in the Treaty of Tordesillia, the agreement to split the “New World” between Portugal and Spain does not give any claim to the native populations of these places…the people who already lived there! Thus a power dynamic has been established by the governments of the nations involved in colonising a third party. Similar cases are involved in all historic cases of colonisation. A power dynamic is formed, and this allows the extraction of resources and wealth, further enforcing the power dynamic relationship. When that power dynamic is challenged in any way…well, we know what happens[5].
Colonisation, then, is a top-down political process, establishing a power dynamic between institutions and nations such that one can extract resources and wealth from the others. Importantly, we note that the extraction of wealth reinforces the political power dynamic through the medium of economic power. This makes it extremely hard, and progressively harder, to resist, as the very things required to resist are what are being taken. Historian Ibram X. Kendi has argued that local forms of racial discrimination themselves also emerge from these types of top-down political processes[6]. Our leaders do things (apparently on our behalf), and excuses are made at the individual level to justify the unethical behaviours required of them / forced upon them by their leaders.
So given that colonisation is a political process, what is decolonisation, really? Is it not also a political process, with action required at the political level to make the socio-economic structural changes required to unpick the history of colonial effects? I think that it is. How might we achieve this, and what will it look like?
Well, there are two possibilities, shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: The two structures of a decolonised pair of institutions. The key point is that in both cases, both institutions are of roughly equal size / power. a) Complete separation. b) Dynamic equilibrium
The first is to completely remove all (power) relations of one country from another, and vice versa. Not only is this undesirable (Trump’s stupid idea of building a wall, for example), but from the current state of globalisation, it is basically impossible anyway. The second may be called “post-colonialism”, as rather than going back to how it was, we are moving forward. In this case, we have a constant two-way movement of resources and wealth between institutions / nations. This is what I suggest that we aim for as institutions. To truly decolonise, we need to form a dynamic equilibrium of moving resources and people between institutions and nations which have currently existing hierarchical power dynamics, in order to eliminate those very dynamics.
Are We decolonising now? Well…
We have seen that universities speak of decolonisation of the education. The University of York has provided some great examples of where to start in the physical sciences[4]. The University of Leeds began the process of decolonising the eduction by supporting a student through the Leeds Institute for Teaching Excellence (LITE) on decolonising the reading lists[7]. This was a wonderful piece of research investigating the implicit bias and normalisation of reading lists, and advised moving away from a primarily Western perspective. Indeed, if I were to learn about the British domination of India (the “British Raj”, mid-1700s to mid-1900s) or China (the Opium Wars, mid-late 1800s), I might want to read some books and hear some perspectives from Indian and Chinese scholars. The University of York also wrote a piece with suggestions for how the physical sciences might start unpicking these biases in their own fields[3]. That universities are attempting to bring diverse voices to the table at all levels is admirable and necessary…but unfortunately, this action is not decolonisation. It is equality, diversity, and inclusivity (ED&I), a related but separate endevour. What then are UK universities doing with regards to political decolonisation at the institutional level?
Universities around the UK currently charge international students upwards of 2-3x the fees they charge for native students. You heard me, and feel free to look up the costs. Here are examples from my own subject in Leeds & York[8,9]. Now, university fees are already through the roof. A cynic might say that the real purpose of university today is to outsource public debt into private hands, to keep the debt-based economy running in a country fueled by speculative finance. Putting that to one side, thanks to government policy, UK universities are forced to compete over students. The fees will not decrease while demand for university education is high, and given that a university education is the only feasible way up the socio-economic ladder these days, it’s basically a necessity. Demand is going nowhere. Universities must therefore compete not by lowering fees, but by building bigger and better campuses. In other words, gentrification. So, our universities are attracting international students and using their money (which is now ~54.7% of the undergraduate income at Leeds[10]; over half) to gentify our campuses. Hmmm, that does not sound like decolonisation to me. In fact, it sounds like the exact opposite.
Let me be clear (for my own job security). This is not the fault of the universities. While I am criticising university policy here, I am also recognising that those policies are almost unavoidable thanks to the political framework UK universities exist within. Universities have been forced into a situation of forced economic competition with one another by government policy. It is the government’s fault…but universities can do something about it at their own policy level.
So how can we actually decolonise?
There is an important statement to be made here: there is a difference between blame and responsibility. It is not the fault of anyone alive today that colonial atrocieties occured, but it is our responsibility to recongnise the long-term impacts and fix them. I have already argued that this must occur at the political scale; that of institutions or nations with the power to make large-scale changes in existing power dynamics. I’ve also argued, and think that it is very important, that we openly recognise that our current institutional policies at universities throughout the UK are not only not decolonising, but are actively opposed to the process. So what can we do about it?
Universities in the UK can begin partnerships with international institutions over which we have a socio-economic power relationship. Rather than just working together on single research projects or collaborations, we can directly invest in those countries at similar scales as we invest in our own. In their book “Just Give Money to the Poor”, Hulme et al. give compelling evidence that money provided with as few strings attached as possible has a dramatic effect on reducing inequality and hence removing existing power dynamics[11]. Together with this, we can then incentivise our students to study abroad in our partner institutions, aligning our education of their students. This will form a two-way cultural exchange, further bringing current power relations and colonial gaps. The University of Leeds already has experience in access and participation for low-interest areas, and so are well equipped for this challenge[12]. These two things combined are what is truly necessary to eliminate colonial legacies at the political level, where the work truly needs to be done.
Bibliography
[1] University of Leeds. “Decolonising the University“. Date Accessed: 27/03/2023, https://www.leeds.ac.uk/student-success/doc/decolonising-university
[2] University of York. “Statement of approach to decolonising and diversifying the curriculum“. Data Accessed: 27/03.2023. https://www.york.ac.uk/staff/teaching/inclusive-learning/ourcurrentwork/decolonisinganddiversifyingthecurriculum/statementofapproach-decolonisinganddiversifyingthecurriculum/
[3] Dessent, C.E.H. (2022). J. Chem. Ed. 99(1), 5-9.
[4] UNESCO, “Treaty of Tordesillas”, Date Accessed: 27/03/2023, https://en.unesco.org/memoryoftheworld/registry/613
[5] Hinton, A. L., Woolford, A., & Benvenuto, J. (2014). Colonial Genocide in Indigenous North America. Duke University Press.
[6] Kendi, Ibram X. (2017). Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. Nation Books.
[7] Nyeko-Lacek, Esta-Rose, “Decolonising reading lists“. Date Accessed: 27/03/2023, https://www.leeds.ac.uk/student-success/dir-record/profiles/18511/esta-rose-nyeko-lacek
[8] University of Leeds, “Physics BSc(2023)”, Date Accessed: 27/03/2023. https://courses.leeds.ac.uk/3580/physics-bsc#fees
[9] University of York, “BSc (Hons) Physics (2023)”, Date Accessed: 27/03/2023. https://www.york.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/courses/bsc-physics/#fees
[10] University of Leeds, “Annual Report and Financial Statements for year ended 31 July 2022 ”, pg 76. Date Accessed: 27/03/2023. https://www.leeds.ac.uk/downloads/download/72/our_reports_and_accounts
[11] Hulme, D., Hanlon, J., & Barrientos, A. (2014). Just give money to the poor the development revolution from the Global South. Kumarian Press.
[12] University of Leeds, “Access and Participation Plan”, Date Accessed: 27/03/2023. https://www.leeds.ac.uk/downloads/download/93/access_and_participation_plan