At least since Plato, philosophers have argued that parents are naturally unfit to educate their children. In an ideal state, philosopher-kings such as he ought to usurp their role. Plato had no children. But the enlightened Rousseau, whose ideas ground modern educational theory, was so enamoured with the idea of the state’s responsibility in administering social justice, and in absolving himself of parental responsibility, that he placed the five children he conceived out of wedlock in state orphanages.
In his 1935 BBC radio debate with another statist educator, philosopher Bertrand Russell, G.K. Chesterton wryly retorted what every reasonable person recognizes. The immoral example of exceptional men like Rousseau proves the rule: Parents are by nature best positioned to bring up their children. They don’t raise themselves.
The intervention of the Second World War and the rise of Communism briefly settled the matter. Yet the brief success of the ideologues that shared Russell’s conviction in the interim led a nascent UN to push back. In its 1959 Rights of the Child, parents were declared to have primary responsibility in educating their children. The declaration was meant to set a hedge of protection for families against the totalitarian impulse of philosopher-kings. (more...)
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