Conflict of Interests: The Politics of American Education (Seven Hundred C 02 Series) [Paperback]

Joel H. Spring (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1992 | ISBN-10: 0801307899 | ISBN-13: 978-0801307898 | Edition: 2 Sub

Conflict of Interests: The Politics of American Education provides a critical understanding of the political and social forces shaping educational politics in the United States. It describes and analyzes how policy is made for American schools, and its effect on all our lives and thinking. Spring argues that the politics of education is driven by a complex interrelationship between politicians, private foundations and think tanks, teachers' unions, special-interest groups, educational politicians, school administrators, boards of education, courts, and the knowledge industry. This text uses many current examples to illustrate conflicts over educational policies. Spring links these conflicts to economics, culture, multiculturalism, language, religion, and equal opportunity. Spring discusses textbook publishing, standardized testing, the political uses of the judicial system, and the politics of education at each level of government. A new first chapter, "Educational Politicians and the Doctors of Spin," examines the impact of President Clinton's New Democratic politics on educational policies and the influence of the Christian Coalition on the Republican Party. A new chapter 4 includes a new section on "The Revolt against Bureaucracy" explaining the ideological origins of attacks on educational bureaucracies. A new chapter 6, "Reinventing the Schools," discusses school choice and the New Democrats' call for a reinvention of schools.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 238 pages
• Publisher: Longman Pub Group; 2 Sub edition (August 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0801307899
• ISBN-13: 978-0801307898
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,504,666 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Joel Spring is Professor at Queens College and the Graduate Center, The City University of New York.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Who Controls Schools? Read this to find out., November 11, 2006

By 

B. Lack (Atlanta, GA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Conflict of Interests: The Politics of American Education (Paperback)

Joel Spring paints a rather disturbing picture of American education by asking the often overlooked question, Who controls our schools? (hint: not classroom teachers) According to him, it's not necessarily school administrators or superintendents--it's special interest groups. Past efforts to take schools out of politics have ultimately failed because behind every bureaucrat in the public school system is a long trail of puppeteers that ultimately leads back to corporate powerhouses. Spring has obviously read across disciplines, and although he makes his liberal bias very transparent, he renders a very compelling argument.

One of his more interesting claims lies in his critique of site-based management (SBM) as an ostensibly democratic reform model that instead reflects the conservative power structures of hierarchy in local, state, and federal policymaking. "Management" is essentially an Orwellian term, and the function it actually serves is to devolve a very rigid package of curriculum and instruction to teachers, students, and community members. In this sense, there is nothing "local" about local control. Spring argues that if these street-level bureaucrats were actually given the freedom to negotiate the distribution of specific kinds of knowledge, then the practice of SBM would actually reflect the rhetoric it has been built upon.

Reading this book has revealed rather poignantly the minimal amount of control certain policy figures actually have in negotiating the distribution of knowledge within schools. Aside from addressing the political economy of textbook publishing and the test-producing industry, Spring also dissects the processes involved in the federalist system of policymaking. I, personally, never realized how weak our superintendents can tend to be, especially in factional communities, as they often teeter-totter between attempting to appease various board members/powerful interest groups and maintaining tenure in office. Spring does not shortchange readers on vivid examples that help bring clarity to his description of the complex policy matrix; especially enjoyable was the reference to a superintendent who "could barley light a cigarette at board meetings and was rapidly developing ulcers" (p. 144). More importantly, he is consistently cautious in stressing the fluidity in many of the models he uses in his analysis: In this particular case, he warns that the political power of educational bureaucracies and teachers' unions often tempers the effect of community power structures.

It's amazing to realize how the practice of using schools as political battlefields simply goes back to the fundamental divide between social reconstructionists and administrative progressives (Spring draws heavily from Tyack's The One Best System). Spring argues that the former group sees the eradication of poverty being contingent upon educating "active citizens" who will work to change the unequal distribution of resources in society. The latter group, which is generally composed of business leaders, argues that poverty can be eliminated by "giving the children of the poor an education that will help them to fit into existing economic and political relationships" (p. 34). The emphasis is on active versus passive citizenship--according to Spring--which sets up his parting shot, namely, that democratic, majoritarian control of public schools is inherently repressive of minority groups, and therefore contains "the seeds of destruction of a democratic society" (p. 196). This breeds some interesting questions: What is democracy? Does democracy naturally "eat itself alive," or do market forces contribute to its distortion?

After reading Spring, I am tempted to concede: We live in a political society that is much closer to oligarchy than true democracy.

1 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Raving socialist propaganda, January 2, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Conflict of Interests: The Politics of American Education (Paperback)

Spring is clearly a raving socialist. He provides a good picture of the mechanics of educational policy but from a very liberal perspective. He uses numerous illustrations which leave no doubt about his political position. The book has several false remarks about conservative leaders that border on libel. It is a shame that he couldn't put his biases aside and write a good book.