The limitations of inter-group learning in confessional school systems: the case of Lebanon.

• Author: Abouchedid, Kamal

INTRODUCTION

CONCERN WITH THE NATIONAL ROLE of education in Lebanon has been a roller coaster phenomenon over the last few decades of the country's political history, rising and falling with political changes and power-sharing formulas of multi-communal coexistence. The various political power-sharing formulas--defined by informal or formal pacts, (1) and acknowledged by the country's politically influential leaders and confessional communities (2) -- have exerted considerable influence over the role of education as a potential agent of national political socialization. More recently, the Ta'if agreement in 1989 called for the re-socialization of schoolchildren along national unitary lines within the framework of "Lebanon is a final homeland for all its sons" and "Arab in its affiliation and identity." At the curricula level, the Ta'if agreement stipulated categorically the need to standardize textbooks in history as well as civics in such a way that they promote national integration.

After more than one decade of the signing of the Ta'if agreement, Lebanon's educational system is flawed by two immediately discernible shortcomings. First, the failure of the Ministry of Education to develop a standardized history textbook attests to the difficulties educational decision-makers face in achieving consensus as to how Lebanon's history and political system should be interpreted and taught. (3) Secondly, awareness of and sensitivity to teaching religion in Lebanon is evident in the government's reluctance to introduce religion courses in the new curriculum. Against this backdrop, many private-run confessional schools continue to teach religion as they see fit with no clear directions from the Ministry of Education about the content and the way in which these courses should be taught. In addition, Lebanon's disputatious political culture, (4) which is mirrored, partly at least, in a scattered nugget of history textbooks, (5) invites speculations about the capability of schools' policies and pract ices to promote inter-group learning through the history curriculum. The scantiness of data on how private-run confessional school policies and practices respond to pluralism through inter-group learning in the history and religion curricula, indicate the need for systematic research on the effectiveness of these schools in preparing students for life in plural Lebanon.

Pluralism in Lebanon requires more than acknowledging or celebrating diversity. It requires bringing about mutual respect and empathy through accentuating and teaching about commonality as well as differences among students, through an inter-group learning process. Studies on inter-group learning have shown that the more children learn about each other religious and cultural differences, the less negativism they will have toward other groups. (6) Studies have also shown that by exposing students to knowledge about diversity and the contributions of various groups to culture and civilization, educators in the social studies such as history, religion and civics may change negative group stereotypes, reduce intolerance, and enhance cooperation for the common good. (7) Experience in Lebanon pressures for history and religion curricula capable of promoting mutual understanding among students from different backgrounds.

This study examines the extent to which confessional school policies and practices foster inter-group learning among students through history teaching and religious instruction. However, it would be impossible to understand the policies and practices of confessional schools without a reference to the broader historical context of Lebanon's educational system.

THE SURVIVING LEGACY OF THE PAST: FREEDOM OF EDUCATION

The most obvious surviving legacy of the past that pertains to Lebanon's present educational system is freedom of education. Under the Ottoman-French Concordat of 1516, Suleiman the Magnificent granted France a Capitulation Right in cultural and economic affairs that allowed it to introduce the early foundations of Western philosophies of education in the Levant. Later on, the benign mle of Ibrahim Pasha (1831-1840) created favorable political conditions that facilitated the establishment of private schools in Mount Lebanon by both Jesuit and Protestant missionaries. (8) Encouraged by the vigorous efforts of Anglo-French missionaries to spread education in Mount Lebanon, Christian Maronites moved toward establishing their own schools.

Under the Ottoman administrative reforms known as al-Tanzimat 1839-1876), (9) which took place under the subsequent reigns of both Rashid Pasha and All Pasha, Christian communities were accorded substantial citizenship rights that placed them on a par with Muslims. (10) These rights allowed Christian communities in Mount Lebanon to establish educational institutions. Challenged by the proliferation of both foreign and Christian schools in Mount Lebanon, and in an attempt to ward off the possibility of a perceived Western cultural encroachment on Muslims, the Sunni and Druze founded their own schools. (11) The Shi'i remained the only confessional community that took no central part in the educational movement of the time. (12)

Political developments under the French Mandate of Lebanon accentuated the process of broadening the power-base of confessional communities in educational affairs. Ironically, when France declared Greater Lebanon as a potentially viable state in 1920, its mandatory authorities organized education along particularistic confessional lines and ignored its national secular role. (13) Article 10 of Lebanese Constitution of May 23, 1926 echoed Article 8 of the French Mandate by according confessional communities the right to run their own private schools, provided they did not infringe on public order. (14)

The stipulation of Article 10 of the Constitution reflected the desire of leading political and confessional circles to put the socialization process of schoolchildren in "private hands" with minimal state authority over private schools.

With the establishment of the government-run public schools, however, Lebanon's school system became complete, though diversified since it accommodated private schools. It was in that atmosphere of diversified school sub-systems that the first post-independence government appeared as a potential definer of the national role of education. Consequently, the national political objective of the first Lebanese government after independence in 1943 was to obliterate the educational and cultural imprints of the French Mandate. In tandem with this objective, the government sought to expunge the French supervision and inspection scheme of private schools, both confessional and foreign. Section 18 of Decree 1436 dated 23 March 1950 requested that all private schools be subject to the supervision of the Ministry of Education without stating what to supervise or how to supervise them. Overall, political disagreements among confessional communities over issues of national identity and foreign policy culminating into a ful l-fledged civil war in 1958 that prevented the Ministry of Education from realizing its post-independence attempts to nationalize education.

On 16 January 1959, one year after the conclusion of the 1958 civil war, the Lebanese government relinquished its supervision and inspection policies that were promulgated shortly after independence. Private school inspection was no longer the direct responsibility of the Ministry of Education. Section 40 of Decree number 2869 accorded the right to the Governors (Muhafizeen) of Lebanon's six Governorates (Muhafazat) the right to inspect public schools and supervise the private ones. Under this arrangement, the government entertained only a nominal administrative authority over private schools. As a result, the role of education entered into a state of political moratorium within the boundaries of the 1946 National Pact (15) which accentuated consociationalism as a "fair weather model" (16) of political settlement or a sort of "live and let live" pattern of multi-communal coexistence.

Perplexed by the politics of consociationalism, the Ministry of Education failed to express or even to maintain a consistent educational policy. For instance, Section 13 of Decree number 1436 of March 1950 stipulated that "...the curriculum in the private, national, and foreign schools should be the national one." However, it added "...directors of these schools can choose techniques of teaching and add subject matters not included in the national curriculum as they see fit." Private schools were thus able substantially to decide on what is taught and how. More interestingly, the fact that section 13 of Decree 1436 required that only approved books by the Minister of Education be used to teach Lebanese history, textbooks on the history of countries other than Lebanon did not require the consent of the Minister of Education. This situation served to expose students in private schools to conflicting patterns of political socialization. (17)

On the eve of the protracted 1975-90 war, and for the first time in Lebanon's modem political history, confessional communities explicitly expressed their desire to alter the state of oblivion circumscribing the role of education. The Permanent Congress of Superiors General of the Lebanese Monastic Maronite Orders, for instance, released a communique to the public pronouncing a new liberal educational model in Lebanon that purported to support cultural pluralism. It stated that Lebanon's educational system should arm the citizen with the possibility of connecting history with world cultures. (18) On the other hand, the working paper of the Supreme Muslim Shi'i Council called for a standardized educational system emphasizing the national Arab heritage and culture. (19) A similar position was endorsed by the Sunni Muslim paper, which requested that Arabism in Lebanon be established once...