The Fourth Flip

Just caught up with some of the news about this 'war' between a government's institution and students studying in a foreign country.

Students, as intellectual buds, have always played a big role in shaping a country internally, playing the 'people power' factor as the mobilising engines of change. I recall the analysis gained from my history lesson. The first part of nationalism reform was conducted by the intellectual elites studying abroad at that time, with a sense of enlightenment of logic but a high stake considering their aristocratic status. They strove to push the nation forward in a moderate way, but with an obvious hindrance of elite-mass disenchantment, seeing that the mass of that time had little to no access to education. This was the first impact.

The next set of students were the home-grown intellectual elites. Those who could connect more with the situation on ground with less personal stake on themselves considering the outdated aristocratic system. They could afford to be more revolutionary and critical. Combined with the evolving international political environment, this second impact brought independence to nations.

The third impact came from home-grown students in the post-independence era. They could relate with the situation on ground, definitely, with an even less stake on themselves considering that the 'enemy' was an internal one. At the same time, the negative side of the home-grown education system began to show. The little attention put into developing the education system had made the students seemed less and less refined over time. Their intellectual minds were curious, disgruntled by the negative trends happening around them. Yet few could spot the actual problem, and the internal nature of it had made the situation more complicated than what could be pictured by a classic 'Star Wars' movie - heroes vs. evil empire. Hence the incomplete revolution. Hence the start of a ballooning collective confusion.

Then, perhaps this is the fourth impact, a next phase. Here we have a more-or-less changed mass demographic with the advent of technology, and foreign-grown students as the new agents. Those intellectuals are equipped with more proportion of intellectual satisfactions, the insight of objectivity from looking at something from the outside and the critical perspectives many has been longing for. Yet as people of non-aristocratic social structure and globalised environment, their stakes and needs to please the power holder have been reduced significantly. Adding to that is the increasing mass impatience and a couple of ripples that had granted to many, a clearer vision of what they want to see. This entirely new combination had hardly existed before.

Isn't it fascinating?