After reviewing the evolution of attitudes to poverty and education we note how it influenced the early provision of schooling and the emergence of a global agenda for international development and universal education. At first, this agenda was grounded in the Enlightenment values that inspired the Universal Declaration of Human Rights but economic arguments for reducing poverty and expanding education became more prominent towards the end of the 20th century. Sen's notion of development as freedom brings these ideas together and will strongly influence the development agenda for the coming decades. Implementing this agenda will require a shift from top-down, donor-driven projects to grassroots approaches that take advantage of mobile technologies.