The educated person needs to bring knowledge to bear on the present, not to mention molding the future.
In his 1943 novel, published in English as Magister Ludi (1949), Hermann Hesse anticipated the sort of world the humanists want—and its failure. The book depicts a brotherhood of intellectuals, artists, and humanists who live a life of splendid isolation, dedicated to the Great Tradition, its wisdom and its beauty. But the hero, the most accomplished Master of the Brotherhood, decides in the end to return to the polluted, vulgar, turbulent, strife-torn, moneygrubbing reality—for his values are only fool’s gold unless they have relevance to the world.
Postcapitalist society needs the educated person even more than any earlier society did, and access to the great heritage of the past will have to be an essential element. But liberal education must enable the person to understand reality and master it.
ACTION POINT: Read a book on politics, history, or anything that interests you. What did you learn? How can you put that knowledge to work?
Post-Capitalist Society
* Source: The Daily Drucker by Peter F. Drucker