Teaching Engineering, for what? An approach from Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum´s thought

Abstract

In this essay we intend to reflect on the challenges that the current international context presents to the Engineering education, especially in the Latin American background, where there are great socioeconomic inequalities, technological gaps regarding more sophisticated countries, lack of inclusion and sensitivity towards more extreme problems. Likewise, the global context is challenging due to the exacerbated material competition between powerful countries, environmental problems and climate threats. Democratic States primarily face the development gaps and the problem of inequality. We wonder if, so far, technology has promoted inclusive development or not. Has technology contributed to expand the techno-economic gap between nations and within them? If so, can Engineering, for example, become a profession that minimizes inequalities and support greater access to equitable opportunities? Can it reach an increasingly ubiquitous and capillary way to a wider base of beneficiaries and to equitable access to knowledge? We believe that Engineering has a new role in today's world. To address this paradigm, we rely on the concept of development proposed by the Nobel Prize in Economics, Amartya Sen. We analyze his theory of development based on capabilities, freedom and consequent cooperation, with an impact on new approaches to Education, in particular Engineering Education. We discover a new one purpose for this profession, finding in Sen's thought a new and very noble vocation for it. Finally, we propose an analysis of an educational program in Engineering carried out by the Catholic University of Córdoba from the capabilities approach. It’s aim is to identify, in practice, some novel strategies to implement this new role of Engineering on the base of education for freedom.