Uncertain Times and the Specter of Neoliberalism We live in difficult times, in times of monstrous chimeras and evil dreams

and criminal follies. -Joseph Conrad, Under Western Eyes One of the things we public intellectuals can do immediately is to work to uncover and expose the hidden mechanisms that the function to keep neoliberalisms practices, policies and influences so entrenched in the publics psyche through prescribed methods of indoctrination. This indoctrination as Gramsci suggested, maintains control not just through political and economic coercion, but also ideologically, through a cultural hegemony in which the values of the bourgeoisie (upper class) became the 'common sense' values of all. Gramsci, (1998) argued that there are two requirements for ideological hegemony that are equally important, first, economic domination, and second, intellectual and moral leadership. Therefore the supremacy of the bourgeoisie is predicated upon the subordination of groups who are ideologically indoctrinated to accept the ideas, values and leadership of the dominant group who make the various ideological forms of hegemony seem neutral ( Apple, 1993). As a result, a consensus culture develops in which people in the working-class identify their own good with the good of the bourgeoisie, and helped to maintain the status quo rather than revolting. It is therefore the duty of educationists to work to change the negative impact of ideologically driven pedagogy. Henry Girouxs call to all public intellectuals to take action and to develop democratic emancipatory projects that challenge power and dominance and oppression and to defend democracy, democratic public life, and the public sphere in these uncertain times. Giroux (2006) asks what is the task of educators at this time. While there are no simple solutions, he writes that it becomes increasingly important that academics be seen and see themselves as public intellectuals who provide an indispensable service to the nation and to resist the narrow confines of academic labor by becoming multi-literate in a global democracy in ways that not only allow access to new information and technologies but also enable us to be border crossers. Adding that Edward Said took a similar position that academics should engage in ongoing forms of permanent critique of all abuses of power and authority, and to enter into sustained and vigorous exchange with the outside world, as part of a larger project of helping to create the social conditions for the collective production of realist utopias. In order to fight against the deadly instrumentalism and reactionary ideologies and authoritarianism, Giroux (2004) urges educators/academics/public intellectuals to resist the narrow understandings of academic labor, with its specialized languages, its neutralization of ideology and politics through a bogus claim to objectivism, and its sham elitism and expertise rooted in all the obvious gender, racial, and class-specific hierarchies (p.3). Next, I take lead from Paulo Freires seminal work on the Pedagogy of

the Oppressed, where Freire builds his theory of how the oppressed learn to be oppressed and accept their lot in life. He goes further to discuss what must be done to loosen the oppressive chains. Freire (1970) offers a more direct, daily personal experiential approach that involves first understanding one's position in an oppressive system and second, learning and teaching others to be critical and strategic about navigating within and outside of that system. In his notion of critical pedagogy, Freire argues that the individual learns to perceive critically his own mode of existence in the world in which he finds himself. His survival depends on his actions which depend on his decision making faculties based on accurate and objective perception of reality of his surroundings and his world. Perceiving reality with critical objectivism, he sees the world as a reality in process, in 'transformation.' His actions are based on his perception of the reality of his world. He sees his situation, not as fated but as limiting and therefore challenging. He can reflect on his situation critically and objectively and then act on his objective perception of a reality in process. He can make decisions on the basis of this objective perception and move and work to change his situation and transform his world. Without dichotomizing reflection of the world from their action in the world, students and teachers "establish an authentic form of thought and action." (p. 71). Using a lens of class to question, to critique, to expose, to make explicit the oppression of others and the predatory oppression of late capitalism comes from my readings of the work of Peter McLaren who suggests that pedagogy is a process where the teacher and the learner negotiate and produce meaning and are positioned within discursive practices and power/knowledge relations (p. 34). Peter McLarens calls for forms of resistance to globalization, U.S. imperialism, neo-liberalism and the post modern debates as understood and articulate these arguments through a Marxist analysis has also influenced me a great deal. McLaren makes explicit the need for a class based critique in understanding the lessons learned from Latin America, as well as, other global locations still fighting corruption, oppression and Neo-Colonialism. It underscores the partisan nature of learning and struggle" and it begins from the "starting point for linking knowledge and power" of a more dynamic, multi-centered self replete with self repair through critical reflection, and reflexivity (McLaren, 1995, p. 34). The struggle for all those confronting the neoliberal restructuring of what used to be considered beyond the market is illustrated by Stewart Martin. He suggests that core pedagogical concepts and forms, such as rule, freedom, subject, autonomy, and so on, are already involved in capitalisms fundamental antagonistic relation between capital and living labour, where capital exploits the powers of living labour, appropriating the production of surplus value. Capital aspires to autonomy in this relation; a selfvalorization in which it creates its own value, reducing labour to its rule and its interiority. The subjection of living labour makes capital subject, indeed sovereign. Capital, not the consumer, is king. This is expressed in the contractual agreement of a person, who, as such, is assumed to be free and able to sell their labour as their property, becoming a wage laborer through which their capacities are expropriated. But capital, for Marx at least, is ultimately incapable of autonomy. It remains intrinsically dependent on living labour, which is actually creative of value. Autonomy is rather the potential of living labour, not capital. The struggle of labour against capital is therefore a struggle

against the rule of capital, against labors external or heteronymous determination by capital, and for labors self-determination, its autonomy. Hegemony represents the dual nature of power.

Adeleke, Tunde (2002) writes that Paulo Freire describes a situation where those struggling against oppression often end up adapting to the values and strategies of their oppressor(T)hough they may be aware of being dominated, their perception of themselves as opposites of their oppressor does not yet signify engagement in a struggle to overcome the contradiction; the one pole aspires not to liberation, but to identification with its opposite pole. (Freire, 1992, p. 30). This attempt to disown, the hegemonic ethos of the dominant system is a kind of identification that is both curious and problematic in that it is unintended and born of alienation (Tunde, 2002). Consequently, what emerges is a paradigm in which the dominant pedagogy of the oppressor was heavily dependent on the oppression of others. That is, there emerges an equally hegemonic pedagogy; one that asserts and affirms or essentializes particularistic ethos and culture, that are deemed in conflict with those of the dominant group; and one which is often conferred superiority through claims of originality and preeminence. Paulo Freire describes a situation where those struggling against oppression often end up adapting values and strategies of their oppressor, becoming themselves oppressors or sub-oppressors. Though they may be aware of being dominated, yet their perception of themselves as opposites of their oppressor does not yet signify engagement in a struggle to overcome the contradiction; the one pole aspires not to liberation, but to identification with its opposite pole. (Freire, 1992: 30). In the case of black America, there was a strong move to reject the epistemic logic of the oppressor. However, the paradigm that evolves bears strong resemblance to the culturally and racially skewed epistemology of the oppressor (Ibid). This identification is a kind of curious and problematic one in that it is unintended and born of alienation from, and an attempt to disown, the hegemonic ethos of the dominant academic system. Consequently, what emerges is a paradigm based on race, just as the dominant pedagogy of the oppressor was heavily dependent on race. That is, there emerges an equally hegemonic pedagogy; one that asserts and affirms or essentializes particularistic ethos and culture, that are deemed in conflict with those of the dominant group; and one which is often conferred superiority through claims of originality and preeminence. In the next few pages I examine some of the important pieces of this informal curriculum,the relationship between the citizen community and emphasize the hidden messages contained within various models of this relationship with respect to governments obligations to protect citizens and citizen autonomy. One exposed these hidden messages an practices, giving rise to citizens negative attitudes, and beliefs, may create future models for challenging them, as citizens with in a democracy committed to protect.
Another example of concentration of wealth and ownership within a neoliberal globalization model is in the media. Mother Jones magazine reports

that by the end of 2006, there are only eight giant media companies dominating the US

media, from which most people get their news and information. In 1987, the fifty companies had shrunk to twenty-nine. In 1990, the twenty-nine had shrunk to twenty three. In 1997, the biggest firms numbered ten and involved the $19 billion DisneyABC deal, at the time the biggest media merger ever. [In 2000] AOL Time Warners $350 billion merged corporation [was] more than 1,000 times larger than the biggest deal of 1983.i

Ben H. Bagdikian, The Media Monopoly, Sixth Edition, Beacon Press, (2000), pp.xx-xxi.

Project on Student Debt. http://projectonstudentdebt.org/files/File/Private_Loan_Agenda.pdf.