UNESCO's 2030 Document and the Threat from the Minister of Education

Months after the uproar over the implementation of UNESCO's '2030 Document' in Iran and its cancellation by a direct order from the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic, the Minister of Education threatened on Wednesday that any education related to this document would be 'dealt with'. Mohammad Bat'haei emphasized that even 'educational content that is in any way related to this document should not be presented to students.' UNESCO drafted this document following a conference in 2015 attended by ministers and representatives from over 160 countries in South Korea, urging member states to move towards 'equal, inclusive, fair education and gender equality' by 2030. Saeed Piyvandi, an educational sociologist in France, commented to Radio Farda about the Minister's threat: 'It is regrettable that the Minister of Education of a country whose government was a pioneer in accepting the UNESCO charter and declaration two years ago, even holding meetings to implement this document in Iran as much as possible, today resorts to threatening teachers and schools.' In a system where we fundamentally know that teachers and schools have little independence to interpret or change educational programs for themselves, this threat has serious formal and substantive issues. The only thing that might be absent is the spirit of education, the spirit of teaching and training, and the cultural spirit that could at least help the future generation of Iran to build the country's future differently. Mr. Piyvandi, what does this document fundamentally contain that has sparked such debate and even led the Minister of Education to threaten that there should not even be a reference to it? The UNESCO 2030 Document is a global charter and a public international agreement regarding the horizons of education in the next two decades. Therefore, this document is a summary and essence of the achievements of various countries in the field of education, and what education for the future world should contain in terms of messages, methods, and philosophy. This document emphasizes equality among all social groups or minorities, regardless of their culture, language, or religion. All of these should be in favor of equal education, complete equality between men and women, and other discriminations that can poison the spirit of education in any country. Therefore, this document is nothing but the essence of several decades of the entire human community that UNESCO has presented as a proposal, not an obligation or a law, and all countries are thinking about it. This document does not only concern Iran or this or that country. Even in European countries like France or North America, there is talk everywhere about the gap between the education we provide and the educational ideal that UNESCO proposes, and how we should bridge this gap. For our future education to be human-centered, justice-oriented, non-discriminatory, and most importantly, worthy of the spirit of humanity in the 21st century. When it became clear that this document was being implemented in Iran, on May 7 of last year, Ayatollah Khamenei intervened and said no, absolutely not, this document cannot be used, this is the Islamic Republic, and added (according to him) this is not a place where the defective, destructive, and corrupt Western lifestyle can exert influence. After these remarks from the Supreme Leader, members of parliament and others rushed to outdo each other, leading to the current situation with the Minister of Education. Why do you think the Supreme Leader has become opposed to this document to such an extent? In my opinion, two analyses could be correct: first, that in the atmosphere of Iran at that time, meaning before the revolutions, Ayatollah Khamenei wanted to intervene politically indirectly in the elections by condemning the government and igniting a controversy over this document to influence the electoral atmosphere of that time; this seems to me to be one of the important hypotheses. The second hypothesis is a bit stronger, that there are essentially points in this document that contradict the philosophy of the spirit of education in Iran. That is, if education in Iran is to be based on the equality of all minorities and followers of all religions, and no one is to be discriminated against, and complete equality between men and women is established, along with other discriminations that exist in textbooks or in the discourse of the educational system or in the methods of education in Iran, we would have to completely change the educational system and transform many things in the Iranian educational system for the spirit of education in Iran to come closer to what this document states. Ayatollah Khamenei's opposition includes this, because he is against the equality of men and women, he is against the equality of all religions and the elimination of discrimination against followers of different religions, especially those religions that are not recognized, such as the Baha'i faith. Ayatollah Khamenei is against the equality of all minorities. Ayatollah Khamenei is against teaching human rights and democracy in schools. These are the things mentioned in the UNESCO document that the whole world has accepted, but in Iran, since they want an ideologically top-down education to cultivate uniform thinkers who support the government, an education that is Shia-centered, it is natural that this education would oppose the spirit of the UNESCO document, and the reason for Ayatollah Khamenei's opposition to this document to such an extent stems from these fundamental differences between the UNESCO document, which is very human-centered and sets a very high standard for education, and Mr. Khamenei's philosophy, which advocates a closed, frozen, rigid, authoritarian, and imposed education through the ideology of a religion, namely Shia, to all students, regardless of their relationship with religion and what religion they may have.