This volume of radical studies in the sociology and politics of
education specifically addresses educational policies and the
crisis of the welfare state--one of the central political facts of
our time--and opens up new areas in the critical social analysis of
education. Shapiro explores the interconnection between educational
policy and the structure of economic, political, and cultural life
in the United States, arguing that in spite of its practical and
ideological autonomy, the educational region is not immune to the
kinds of disruption and dislocation found elsewhere in society.
Minority discrimination, urban decay, and the uneven results of the
labor market as well as other conditions force new issues and
questions onto the ideological policy agenda. However, in his
cogent assesment of the state of public discourse, Shapiro
discovers an absence, with one important exception, of reference to
critical themes in mainstream political debate. He delineates the
displacement into the educational area of crises that confront the
lumpen class in America and that are experienced as economic
deprivation, political disempowerment, and cultural disintegration
and then speculates as to why a political agenda that speaks to the
interrelatedness of the social crisis and the educational crisis
remains unconstructed.
The bulk of the eight chapters study a proposed political agenda
for education that is resonant with the cultural concerns and
social needs of subordinate and intermediary groups--a left
agenda--that addresses three key areas: first, the crisis of values
and meanings that consumption capitalism makes inevitable; second,
the sense of disempowerment experienced by both subordinate and
intermediary groups in American society; and finally, the issue of
social justice based on the author's creatively expanded definition
of the issues inherent to this concept including hunger here and
abroad, the distribution of wealth and economic power, inadequate
supply of shelter and medical care, and infant mortality. This
important work with its invaluable analyses and proposals should be
read by those concerned with the possibilities of radical
intervention in public education during a period of conservative
restoration. Must reading for students and scholars concerned with
both the social analysis and critical study of education.
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