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Education: Free & Compulsory

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Murray Rothbard published this small book in two installments in The Individualist some years ago. In it Rothbard sets forth his theory of education and how education relates to the state.

Not surprisingly, Rothbard starts with a discussion of human nature and the basic fact of human inequality. Since people differ in abilities and interests, there will be no one kind of education that is appropriate for all children. Some children will benefit from an education that prepares them for work relatively early in life, others for a career in the professions. A system of voluntary education, where parents choose what is best for their children, is the most efficient system and also the most consistent with individual freedom.

However, government is the great equalizer and centralizer. Rather than accept human inequality, it is intent on creating a "one size fits all" approach to education. As Rothbard shows through an analysis of educational reforms in the US and the world, governments began to create taxpayer funded, compulsory schools in order to indoctrinate children into the ideology of the state. As the elites became more secularized in the 1800s, government run schools were established to destroy the influence of religion and the church.

I can't agree with everything Rothbard says. There are a few unsupported statements (such as his attacks on Protestantism) and gaps in logic, but as usual Rothbard is provocative.

Like other reviewers, I expected more of an argument and analysis of compulsory education. What I found was an overview of the history of forced education, focusing on the motives of the orchestrators. In discussing the history, Rothbard points out the lowest common denominator in all compulsory school advocates: indoctrination. From Luther to Calvin, to the communists, right up to the modern day, compulsory schools have existed to indoctrinate the young to a particular way of thinking.

It is also apparent from this discussion that if school attendance is made compulsory, it stamps out individuality and parental control. The title points out the contradiction in "free and compulsory education" quite poignantly. This was a popular line of communists and socialists in the nineteenth century. The irony is that when education is forced, there can be no freedom. Rothbard could have made this point more explicit and discussed how control over the minds of the young is the first step for the state to take control of society.

Historical examples are strong, but general principle and philosophy are lacking, and this is quite disappointing for a Rothbard book. He usually integrates a good mix of principle and example to illustrate a clear and consistent point. If you're interested in the history of compulsory education, read this. If you're looking for a discussion of the problems with state education, there are better choices.

An excellent overview of the history of the public education system in america, and its roots in other cultures. This book makes the case that public education exists to indoctrinate children to be accepting of the state. Historically, public education has existed to undermine the parents' ability to raise children to be independent.

Few things can make me feel as uncomfortable as the unsavory expression of ideas I basically agree with. I bought this book because I expected a good argument for and information to support the ideas I instinctively believe in and support. Unfortunately this book is more of an affirmation than an argument; more of a manifesto than an essay; propaganda rather than analysis.
The arguments are indisputable, but not particularly well presented.
I've always been a strong opponent of compulsory public education but the way the arguments are presented in this book make me twitch. My support for the ideas of non-compulsory non-public education does not stem from the fact that I do not want my children to mix with the `moronic' and `substandard' ones.
The only information that was news to me was the Lutheran-Calvinist influence in the birth of public education.
I think my misgivings can be understood considering the level of ignorance displayed in some of the passages. Mistaking Sade for Rousseau is absolutely inexcusable. I have not read "Emile" myself, but at least I know about it; I know what it is about and if I was to write about education, I would make an effort to read it. Making a vague reference to the wrong author does not inspire confidence in other references presented by Mr. Rothbard.

Should you read this book? Since it is very short, I would say why not? If you are interested in the subject this will introduce you to the basic libertarian ideas concerning it. Just do not expect high quality arguments.

Here Rothbard, famed as an economic theorist and historian, takes on modern compulsive education and delivers the same no-holds-barred treatment he used for every subject he wrote about.

Published as a two-part installment in The Individualist way back in '71, the essay is perhaps even more pertinent now, as almost each and every politican of every conceivable stripe and ideology attempts to wrest the mantle of education champion from his rivals. Rothbard shows that compulsive education is little more than a scheme by professional educationalists (as opposed to honest teachers) to inculcate young people into obedience to the State and into false notions of equality. It has always been that way, from the inception of public schools by Martin Luther and the Prussians, up to the present day. Rothbard hates the collectivism imposed by these beauracrats. He sees true education as a means for a person to develop an individual consciousness and to be able to reason for himself. In that sense a person can be "educated" without going to school at all. Yes, Rothbard says it - he is one of the few people with the guts - formal schooling is NOT for everyone, and those young people without academic proficiency or intellectual curiosity only bring down more gifted students. (Can you imagine George Bush or Bill Clinton or Newt Gingrich or Bill Bennett or anyone else of their ilk saying such a thing? Nah.)

The book is not merely a libertarian diatribe, however. It is a history lesson, delivered with punch and succictness.

I am a long time teacher. The book opened my eyes in many ways.

As far as I'm concerned, Murray Rothbard is one of the greatest unsung intellectuals of the twentieth century. He was also one of the most prolific, producing many works on economics, history, and philosophy. Always he took the side of liberty and opposed statism and coercion in all its forms.

So I was very happy to find a little book by him on education. Overall it was a very good, concise sketch of the ideology and history behind compulsory, government-run education in the West, with a bit about what's wrong with it on a philosophical level from the perspective of individualism. My only complaint is that I wish it were longer and even more comprehensive. It ends kind of abruptly with only a very brief overview of progressive education in the United States. I suppose in light of how prolific Rothbard was overall it's excusable that this work was so short -- still, I would have loved to read a 400-page book by Rothbard on this topic.

FYI, if you want to read a book that goes over some of the same ideas and history in much greater detail, check out The Underground History of American Education: A School Teacher's Intimate Investigation Into the Problem of Modern Schooling.

Rothbard gives us the Libertarian view on education. You may not agree with Libertarians on other issues but on education he hits the bull's-eye. It takes a man with courage to tell things as plainly as Mr. Rothbard tells them, but I'm sure everybody agrees with him though many will not admit it.

Basically "to force into schools children who have little or no aptitude for instruction at all (prevents the education of a child) ... It so happens that among the variety of human ability there is a large number of subnormal children, children who are not receptive to instruction ... To force these children to be exposed to schooling, as the State does almost everywhere, is a criminal offense to their natures. ... the instruction has almost no effect on these children, many of whose hours of life are simply wasted because of the State's decree. .. to dragoon them into a school for a formative decade of their lives, to force them to attend classes in which they have no interest or ability, is to warp their entire personalities." Don't think these kids should just be left alone, no. They get education alright.

"The passion for leveling an enforced equality proclaims: this is good; let every child be forced to learn about 'life' and be forced to associate with the lowest types of humanity. The envy and hatred toward the potentiality of the better and superior child is apparent in this position."

It's true that when Libertarians talk about Freedom they really mean it. Ideas may seem a little over the top, but if you think honestly about them you have to admit that philosophically they are as right as 2+2 are 4.

In this little and very readable book you will find a little history of State compulsion in education in Europe (where all things evil originated -so to say) and finally how it got implemented in America. The simple and clear way he puts things clear and lays responsibilities for the state of education is something truly to be thankful for. You get to know more about education in this little book than reading many politicized/biased propaganda by America's educationists. A plague.

Murray Rothbard's _Education: Free and Compulsory_ is a sketchy tirade against the public education system. Rothbard--a free-market libertarian-anarchist with conservative social leanings--begins with the observation that government movers and shakers to control and indoctrinate the populace can use education as an apparatus. To illustrate his point, the cover features a WWII era poster of American schoolchildren collecting supplies for the US military, with "schools at war" prominently displayed. Rothbard traces the first advocates of state funded education to the Protestant Reformation when secular rulers wanted maintain the Protestant faith as state religions. The country that developed the most comprehensive public education program, with mandatory attendance, was Prussia, whose government Rothbard somewhat unfairly characterizes as overly despotic. The American education establishment, as Rothbard notes, praised the Prussian model and brought an extensive state mandated and compulsory education system to the US during the course of the 19th and 20th centuries. The ulterior motive of the education establishment is to use government schools to indoctrinate the nation's children with loyalty to the state rather than allowing them to develop and educate themselves independently with direct parental involvement. The regimes most openly opposed to individual freedom, like Communist Russia and Nazi Germany, have made no secret of their intention to use public schools to inculcate loyalty to government programs. Rothbard cites the fact that not all children are comfortable in an academic environment and instead points toward a decentralized system of technical training, skilled labor and vocational education, similar to the apprentice system. This would suit the needs of what is naturally an inherently diversified and stratified population rather than forcing all children into public schools, which are often a negative influence because of the social problems the students are exposed to in them (drug addictions, sex, gangs, etc). Rothbard also brings into question many of modern teaching techniques in the schools which downgrade individual reasoning capacity (i.e., not sticking to the basic reading, writing and arithmetic) and instead teach students using images and group projects. He also says that schools should abolish "frills" like physical education and the like to keep students more consistently focused on academics. It is clear to any one interested in this question that public schools are propagandizing to children (especially with regards to environmentalism, anti-religion, multiculturalism and "Holocaustianity" in the US). Rothbard is somewhat over-reactionary in his blanked condemnation of all public education, but he does raise some valid questions regarding the disorientating, anti-family agenda of compulsory education in America.

We talk of how we are going to improve public education, what subjects to teach or not in public education, or how to teach certain subjects in public education. Rarely do we talk about the issue all of these questions presuppose: whether to have public education or whether it is the best way to educate children. If nothing else - and there IS plenty else - Murray Rothbard's short essay "Education: Free and Compulsory" serves to offer up the seldom heard argument against public compulsory education.

There are roughly three arguments used in this book, each taking up about a third of the book:

The first section talks about pedagogical reasons why public compulsory education is not an ideal. Every child, it is noted, has different capacities, interests, and proclivities. Some are bright in mathematics and like bookish knowledge. Others are more creatively inclined, have no aptitude for math altogether, and are more comfortable with hands-on things. Others may really have no ability for academic kinds of knowledge whatever, but could be best served by technical training.

Public education, of course, is the antithesis of this: by its nature, it is standardizing and "averagizing" (in that, for numerical reasons, compulsory universal education cannot focus on differences, but only similarities). Additionally, public compulsory education ensures that students are not schooled in what their talents/interests are, or what their parents want them to learn, but rather what the state believes they should learn. (Why must high schoolers understand Algebra II? Because the government says it is a good idea.)

The second part of the book focuses on exploring the history behind public education in Europe, Asia, and the United States. Much is made of the Prussian model of education, which was the first universal compulsory education system, designed to indoctrinate Prussian children with the things the government thought would make them good citizens. (More on this in The Underground History of American Education: A School Teacher's Intimate Investigation Into the Problem of Modern Schooling.) History shows that the intent behind all attempts - yes, even the American ones - to mandate state education was to inculcate students with the "virtues" thought by the state to make for good citizens (nothing sinister in that!). (Quite a few of the sources Rothbard quotes here refer to students as, in some way, belonging to the state rather than parents.)

To me, the most interesting part was the very last section, where Rothbard turns to examining the (then and now) present educational scene where "progressive" education is much in vogue. Rather than celebrating this idea of "educating the whole child," and "student centered education," Rothbard warns that these ideas often mean that schools have more and more dominion over what students learn. First it was academics, then it was "democratic values" (that Dewey wrote of inculcating children with), then it was health and sex ed, etc, etc. And, of course, compulsory education means that students can be taught things parents object to while giving parents no recourse. (It may be good to ask ourselves here whether there would be a controversy over whether to teach evolution if parents could choose whether students were instructed?)

All in all, this book is a very short, but very powerful, indictment of the idea that the government has any good claim to knowing how best ot educate our children. Rothbard is not against public education as such, but is against the idea of compulsory, state-influenced, education. As an economist and political philosopher of first rate, his arguments are strong and worthy of being heard and acted upon

I'm a pretty big fan of Murray Rothbard, the famous libertarian economist. For this reason, I read _Education: Free and Compulsory_ to get a brief (< 100 pages) glimpse into Rothbard's view on education. Not surprisingly, he comes out in favor of the parent over the state on the question of education.

Along with Rothbard's critique of compulsory education, he provides a brief history of compulsory education in North America and Europe.

I recommend the book if you're a fan of Rothbard's but would, otherwise, point the reader toward a more thorough treatment of the subject of education.