Without a doubt, this is the most exciting time to be alive in all of human history. Looked at it inclusively from any vantage point, the world is better than it has ever been before. That it is the most peaceful era ever has been persuasively argued by Harvard professor Steven Pinker in his fascinating recent book The Better Angels of Our Nature. That our age is the most dynamic is evident to the most casual of observers. The rapid change in what is available for us to use is dizzying. That it is the most economically prosperous era is beyond debate.
There are more people in the world than ever before, and they are richer than ever before. Certainly the benefits of these three aspects of the modern world — peaceful, dynamic, and economically prosperous — are not uniformly distributed around the world. Some areas are more fortunate than others. Understanding how the less fortunate can increase their share has major policy implications for a developing country like India. Understanding the cause of this general prosperity can help in that urgent and important matter. The cause is surprisingly simple and can be expressed in one word: technology.
Not one of us is untouched by technology as we go about our mundane lives. It is ubiquitous, insistent and apparently indispensable. More precisely, we are immersed in the artifacts of technology. Briefly defining technology would be helpful. Technology is “know-how.” It is knowledge about how to do something. The gadgets and gizmos we use reflexively are things into which knowledge or know-how is embodied. Technology is abstract since it is knowledge, not something you can hold in your hand but only in your head. The products of technology are things you can stub your toes on.
Looked at it that way, two things are immediately apparent. First, technology is as old as human civilisation. Human civilisational progress is measured by how humans have learned how to do things in better ways. How to make stone tools marked the first use of technology; later iron and other materials. Agricultural technology gave birth to civilisation. The phenomenal advances in what we call “information technology” — IT — is only the latest in a long series of technological revolutions. Each builds on the combined know-how of all the previous ones. Technology, knowledge, know-how — three words for the same idea — is cumulative and progressive.
The second fact about technology is that it exists only in human brains because only brains are capable of knowing. Information, as distinct from knowledge, can be stored, transmitted, duplicated, retrieved, etc., in myriad media, from stone tablets to paper to silicon chips. But knowledge is what a person knows. Though the cost of information has dropped unimaginably, the cost of acquiring knowledge is as much as it has ever been because the primary cost is time and mental effort. A book on quantum physics is cheap and easy to get; learning quantum mechanics is hard. You can buy a book on French but you cannot buy the ability to speak French.
As noted before, the world is changing rapidly. What does that mean precisely? Certainly we don’t mean that the mountains are shifting or the laws of physics are mutating. The natural world is more or less stable over decades and centuries. The change we see around us is all due to human action, done purposefully. Advances in our knowledge help us to make change more efficiently, for good or for bad. Thus the rapid change we see around us is just a reflection of the fact that knowledge (know-how, technology) is increasing, and with it, our ability to change the world to our will.
More advanced technology means essentially getting more done with the same or less, that is with greater efficiency. Our cars give more kilometres per liter, our bulbs consume less electricity, etc, are trivial examples of better gadgets. Better processes and procedures are also the product of better technology. How to provide better customer service, or how to organise production are other examples of better technology.
Certainly the older method would still work because they did work in the past. But the newer method becomes available because of better knowledge of materials, processes and institutions. They get used because they are better. Adopting better technology is therefore the key to development broadly defined. It is not just in electronic gadgets and gizmos that palpably better technology is available. Humans have acquired better knowledge (read technology) of which governmental, administrative, political, and social processes and institutions work more efficiently. The good news is that those that are lagging in development have the benefit of learning from the more advanced. The operative word is learn. An inability or unwillingness to learn and use more advanced technology is a recipe for poverty of all sorts, material and nonmaterial. Most of the barriers to progress and to the reduction of poverty is a matter of choice, not necessity. The technology exists. Whether we choose to adopt it is entirely up to us.
And now to some policy implications that follow from the brief discussion of technology. Technology (read knowledge) cannot be transferred to unprepared or unwilling minds even though technological artifacts can easily be acquired as gifts or bought. For a population to use (and develop) technology it has to have the ability which can only be acquired through education.
The critical institution for any society’s development is the educational institution. If a country fails in that sphere, there is absolutely no hope for it. India is what is euphemistically called a “developing economy”. More honestly it should be called an “impoverished economy” because it has been made poor. Its poverty is entirely by human design and therefore entirely avoidable. India needs to use better technology in every sphere but nowhere is it more critical than in the educational sector.
In keeping with what was discussed before, that does not mean laptops in every lap, or smartphones in very face. What it means is better ways of organising, administering, financing and operating schools and colleges. State control of education has been a failure. The solution is known, tried, tested and successfully demonstrated in various places.
The solution is to liberalise the sector so that the supply of educational opportunities increases, the quality improves, and the cost decreases. That’s what is meant by the adoption of better technology. With a better educated population, India will be able to use and develop even more technology. Technology, inclusively defined as knowledge and know-how, is absolutely indispensable for India’s development. And the first step in that transformation is the liberalisation of the educational sector.
For too long, India has lagged in development compared to other countries. It has no natural barriers to progress. It is time we looked seriously into removing manmade barriers. For the benefit of 1.2 billion Indians, India cannot afford to miss out on its share of the peace, dynamism and economic prosperity that modern technology brings to life.
Atanu Dey is an economist and author of Transforming India.
Email: atanudey@gmail.com