There has been intense investment in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) across the African continent. The argument is that technological investment is the future. Relatedly, there has also been intense investment in Business, Technical, Vocational Education and Training (BTVET). While investments in STEM and BTVET are undoubtedly worthy investments, Africans tend to invest in them in juxtaposition with the humanities and social sciences. They problematically establish hierarchies in the disciplines—STEM subjects are superior to the arts—and not only invest more in STEM, but ironically cut investment in the arts and social sciences. In Uganda, the government even remunerates teachers in the natural sciences way higher (about USh4 million, over US$1,050) than their counterparts in the humanities and social sciences (USh1.5–2 million, about US$600). About 100 percent more.

As one watches the continent—especially black Africa—pitting STEM against the arts and social sciences, the irony is not lost that this was actually a British colonial policy. With lessons from India, the British did not support the opening of universities teaching the arts and humanities in Africa for fear that this would produce philosophers and revolutionaries. Thus, they opened colleges to train clerks, carpenters, engineers, and medical doctors. Established in 1922, Makerere College served all of East Africa before the opening of the Royal Technical College in Kenya in 1956. They opened Achimota College in Ghana in 1927 and Kumasi College of Technology in 1951. In Sudan, they had opened Gordon Memorial College in 1902. Apart from teaching Shakespeare, they feared that students educated in the arts and the humanities tended to craft anti-exploitation arguments and stir revolt.

What is entirely missing in our current World Bank-designed curricula that privilege the natural sciences over the arts is the understanding that the knowledge and practice of natural sciences are governed by politics. STEM and BTVET are social sciences in the first instance, before becoming natural sciences. The design of a chair is a political intervention; it is a radical negotiation. Furniture is not simply a quest for comfort and beauty, it is also an identity of class and social standing, like clothes. It is not an innocent assemblage of timber, glue and nails but a series of debates and histories, arguments and counter-arguments reflecting both the time and environment. So are architecture and mechanical engineering. They are legitimized and influenced by regimes of politics and violence. (I hope I’m not being too PhD!)

The truth is that without a firm ideological and moral guidance—rooted in the arts, theological and social sciences—STEM can be deployed in the manufacture of nuclear weapons, bring about ecocide, or gangster capitalism. Anchored right, the same sciences can be used in the manufacture of cancer treatment therapy. Internet technology has been used for the promotion of pornography, the commodification and objectification of women (Pornhub and OnlyFans)—a very profitable business—instead of being used for the advancement of the human condition.

I need to stress a couple of points here—with lessons from Iran. Firstly, investment in the social sciences and the arts is as crucial as investment in the natural sciences. Maybe even more so. If we look at Iran and the advances the country has made in the natural sciences (STEM), one has to appreciate the ideological anchors guiding its scientific breakthroughs. Schooled in the arts and social sciences of religion and spirituality, Iran’s scholar-Ayatollahs have been core guides in this journey. No wonder Iran is the only country with an anti-nuclear weapons fatwa—built on religious ethics and scholarly traditions—despite the country’s ability and capacity to make nuclear weapons. (You can argue with that if you like.)

The second point, again building on Iran, is that we ought to aspire to the best education, all the way to the top. We need as many master’s degrees and PhDs as possible. But at the same time, we will definitely need to create space for these PhDs to thrive. Notice that when individuals spend years immersing themselves in learning and acquiring knowledge, it is unlikely that they will double up as revolutionaries at the same time. (In an environment that privileges STEM over the humanities, earning a PhD is in itself an act of resistance. Even a PhD in STEM is a revolutionary act. One or two PhD scholars might double up as street revolutionaries—as has become commonplace in Iran—but being a graduate with this top qualification is a revolution in itself.) The point I want to stress here is that whoever is lucky enough to take power ought to invite PhDs and master’s degree graduates to serve the country. We need the best from among us, and presently, the best yardstick (could be imperfect, undoubtedly) is education. Power without the best brains and hands is nothing but itself a highway to national destruction (see what Trump is doing to the United States?).

I agree entirely. Many PhDs in Kampala, Nairobi, Accra, London, and New York have been entirely disappointing. And the disdain they receive is warranted. But this does not diminish the need for more of them. You cannot replace a well-trained football team—because of poor performance—with an eleven of untrained good people. It is also true that non-PhDs—even complete illiterates—have done amazing things. But there are more guarantees with educated folks than with our non-educated successful compatriots. If a PhD was taken as a metaphor for good education, and if a bachelor’s degree is undoubtedly good, why not aspire for the best that can be?

I will stress one more time: PhDs shine best under regimes of power that appreciate their learning. Again, the majority of PhDs are workers and thinkers. They can be revolutionaries too, but these are essentially workers and thinkers—providing the intellectual base for revolution. Under a regime of corrupted revolutionaries, PhDs would be as captured as everyone else.

Following the rabid embrace of IMF and World Bank neoliberal policies in the 1980s (to the point of calling university education a luxury), bwana Yoweri Museveni has been very successful in cheapening education and other higher qualifications. Realizing there would be no need for any public investment and local expertise (since the economy was in the hands of corporate capital from the western world), Museveni transformed himself into some form of AI engine or Google, with answers to each and every question; he is not only the country’s lead economist, but he is also the best virologist (COVID-19 showed us that), the best university admin, educationist, industrialist, linguist, cleric, all of them.

If Museveni recruits a PhD to work in his government—and there are so many examples—they have to subject their learning to his omnipotent expertise. And thus, despite the personal failing of many PhDs in Museveni’s government, their expertise was never needed in the first place. They fail for simply being there, not because of anything they would have done. The problem is that we have used “disappointing PhDs” under Yoweri Museveni to judge all PhDs. We needed a new yardstick, a new space to see PhDs in action, and Tehran has graciously offered us one.

Sadly, to underscore the extent of the malaise, even folks in the opposition actually agree with Museveni on the “uselessness” of educated folks. You’ll hear them repeating tired and hackneyed pronouncements that the “educated are the problem,” to which Museveni responds by giving the country a “cabinet of fishermen”—his own words. No country ever transformed itself by not deploying its best to safeguard its core interests. I will say it one more time: you cannot replace a team of professional, well-trained footballers—because of bad performance—with a team of fans, because they are good noisemakers. If there is anything we should take from Iran (and there are too many things to count), it is that the more PhDs, the more solid the country and the government.