Barack Obama has made much of his hopes for a renewed approach to common challenges, should he succeed in his bid for the US presidency. He advocates a new ‘Marshall Plan’, which would see the US and Europe united with other key players around the world to confront the common threats that now affect us all. And in the race for the presidency, it is likely that Obama and McCain will go head to head in setting new targets for foreign policy, whether for climate change, troops in Iraq, ending US oil dependency or overseas development spending.
Amidst the blitz of targets we can expect in the run up to November, both sides should consider the lessons from the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), eight of which have been set for 2015, and agreed by world leaders at a UN summit in 2000.
One lesson they might find is the ‘inconvenient truth’ that the imperative for policymakers to create plans and set targets can undermine the very goals they hope to achieve.
Let us look at the MDG for universal primary education by 2015. This goal arose from the recognition that education is both key for individual life opportunities and for broader economic and social development – an endorsement of the progressive commitment to education.
Progress towards this MDG seems promising. Global net enrolment for primary schooling increased from 83 to 87 per cent between 1999 and 2005, increasing most rapidly in Sub-Saharan Africa (23 per cent) and South and West Asia (11 per cent).
Yet look behind the headlines of increasing access and the prospects of achieving real change for primary school children in some of the poorest countries looks rather slim.
Despite significant increases in those entering school, many children still leave primary education in Africa unable to read and write. The push for access and retention, it seems, may have overlooked the crucial importance of quality. Children may turn up to school to find no textbooks or teachers with little or no training. For these reasons and others, even if universal primary schooling is achieved by 2015, it may not lead to the development outcomes progressives would hope for.
This does not mean we should live in a target-less world. Obama’s meteoric rise alone has revealed that policymakers need to provide a vision for the future which inspires and galvanises populations. But world leaders also need to ensure that the targets which are set are the right ones.
Do we care if every child attends a primary school, or is our target that every child receives the core life skills that enable them to capitalise on opportunities? If it’s the latter, then evidence suggests that a mother’s level of education may be the biggest influence on their children’s educational attainment. The focus on formal primary schooling may, however, overlook early childhood development and literacy and skills programmes for parents despite their direct impact on learning outcomes for children.
As every policymaker soon realises, the greatest test of any policy agenda or goal is the outcome it produces, whether intended or not. In the case of primary education for all, this means not just the number of children in schools but the impact of that education on the lives of those who experience it. Evidence suggests that the latter is being overlooked in the rush to meet the MDGs.
If Obama is serious about starting a new era in US foreign policy, and a new approach to global issues, he would do well to bear this in this mind. For in the end, if successful, his presidential legacy will have less to do with the numerical targets set during the election campaign and more to do with the outcomes they achieve.
Leni Wild works for Education Action ([email protected]). Alan Johnson is away.