As soon as this reform was introduced, it caused widespread debate in all walks of life. Although there are many voices of supporters, some opponents believe that preschool education is unique, basic and universal. Developed countries have included it in the supply of public goods, and many countries have achieved free preschool education. Privatization of preschool education is against the trend.
Obviously, one of the focuses of controversy involves the essence of education. In other words, is education a public interest or a private interest? Many people think that education is a public product, because it has certain externalities, which is beneficial to the development of the whole society and the national competitiveness. However, this statement is specious, because it does not define the nature of education from its own characteristics. According to the principle of political economy, there are at least two criteria to examine whether an article is public or private. First, it depends on whether the consumption of this kind of goods is competitive. In other words, when one person consumes this item, will it reduce the consumption of this item by others? The second is to see whether the consumption of the item is exclusive, that is, whether a person can exclude the consumption of the item by others when consuming the item. At the same time, it is competitive and exclusive for personal items, such as bread, books and bicycles. When a person consumes these items, it will not only make others unable to consume them. And it is easy to exclude others' consumption. On the contrary, non-competitive and non-exclusive public goods, such as national defense and outdoor air purification, are typical. One person's consumption of these goods does not affect other people's consumption of them at the same time, so it is extremely difficult to exclude other people's consumption.
According to this standard, it is difficult to say that education (except nine-year compulsory education), especially preschool education, is a public product. On the one hand, education consumption in most stages is competitive, and the cost of education (teachers and educational facilities) will increase with the increase of consumers (students); On the other hand, the consumption of education is exclusive and consumers who do not pay (tuition fees, etc.). ) It is easy to be excluded from education. That is to say, in terms of the nature of education itself, it is not a public good, but a private good. From the experience, the widespread existence of private education can also prove that education is not a public good, because if it is a public good, others will not enjoy it.
Then, why do so many people think that education is a public good? This is largely due to the publicity and nationalization of education since19th century. With the rise of the welfare state and the popularity of various collectivism thoughts, the private goods of education are artificially publicized and nationalized and regarded as public goods. This kind of publicity and nationalization is not only regarded as a means to strengthen the country and enhance the national competitiveness, but also a manifestation of paternalism in the field of education. Education is a private matter, and individuals can freely choose the education that suits them according to their own needs. This is a universal educational model in the world before19th century. Many well-known primary and secondary schools, such as St Paul's School and Westminster School in Britain, and first-class universities, such as Harvard and Yale, are private schools. The publicity and nationalization of education means that the state or government decides whether to receive education and what education to receive for people.
Some people may say, what's wrong with the state providing education as a public product? What I want to say is that it looks fascinating to be provided by the state, but we should not forget that every penny of education provided by the state comes from taxpayers. The country never makes money. On the contrary, it is the biggest consumer, and it is often a consumer with the characteristics of waste and abuse. Democratic countries are no exception, but the degree of waste and abuse is different. When we pay taxes to the state and the state provides education, we create opportunities for waste and abuse, including paying the huge administrative costs required for the operation of the state. Just look at how the frequent educational evaluation in our school wastes people and money.
In addition, some people think that the education provided by the government helps to promote educational equity. This statement is groundless. In fact, most of the unfairness in China's education field is caused by government policies and laws, such as the hukou system that leads to unfair education in urban and rural areas, the unfair enrollment quota system among regions, and the school grading system. Obviously, the government often can't be the promoter of educational equity that people expect, but education is unfair.
More seriously, a common consequence of state-provided education is that the nature of education is distorted. According to the classic educational concept, the purpose of education is to cultivate individuals with independent personality and free spirit, not to cultivate screws that obey a certain ideology or are useful to the country, nor to cultivate machines that follow the rules and lack innovative spirit. To achieve this goal, education must gain a high degree of autonomy, including school autonomy. And the autonomy of teachers and students. This autonomy means that major issues in education should be decided by schools, teachers and students, not by the state or the government. To paraphrase a western proverb: God belongs to God and Caesar belongs to Caesar. Similarly, education belongs to education.