By Makiko Kondo, Development Education Association and Resource Centre (DEAR), Japan.
What is education for? This is a universal question that has been asked for many years: Is it for the learner or to build society? We say – Of course, it is for the learner but both of them are important purposes of education. And we, in Japan, have to remember that education historically has always been a strong tool for building a nationalistic society or developing human resources needed for a ‘strong nation’.