Nicaragua’s Literacy Campaign - Background paper prepared for the Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2006

Introduction The National Literacy Crusade that took place in Nicaragua from March to August 1980 was probably the biggest venture of the Sandinista rule (1979-1990) and without a doubt the most important event within the reform of the education system. Further to the achievement of reducing the overall illiteracy rate from 50.3% to 12.9% within only five months, it signified a break with fundamental elements of the previous education system and was at the same time a laboratory conducive to alternative educational designs. It produced a lasting impact on a whole generation of young people at that time but it also was and continues to be a controversial undertaking. Even two decades later many people commemorate their participation in the campaign as a “heroic deed” that marked their lives (Rocha, J.L., 2000; Nicaragua News Service, 2004), whereas the ruling Liberals and other opponent groups accuse the Sandinistas of using the campaign as a tool for “political indoctrination” (Arnove, R.F., 1994:45) and prefer to obliterate this event from the memories of the education history. Being a building block of the political program of the Sandinista Revolution, the campaign cannot be perceived without its very particular historical, political and social context. In pre- revolutionary Nicaragua a comprehensive conception of adult literacy and education practically did not exist. A “complete neglect” of this field was typical for the Somoza- dictatorship which governed during more than four decades (Tünnermann, C., 1980:30). For Somocism, literacy for the majority of the population was “unnecessary, inappropriate and impossible” (Armas, L., 1981:86). Somocism was not interested in promoting massive literacy for political reasons. Literacy would have empowered people for democratic participation. Economical reasons did not play a major role, thus the exploitation model of the Somoza dynasty was based on uneducated agricultural workers. Dr. Ulrike Hanemann UNESCO Institute for Education Hamburg, Germany Press link to read the entire report