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Curriculum, Capitalism, and Democracy: A Response to Whitty's Critics Author(s): Michael W.

Apple Reviewed work(s): Source: British Journal of Sociology of Education, Vol. 7, No. 3 (1986), pp. 319-327 Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1392821 . Accessed: 12/03/2013 16:08
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Curriculum, Capitalism, and Democracy: a response to Whitty's critics

MICHAEL W. APPLE, Universityof Wisconsin,Madison

I do not make a habit of responding to reviews either of my own work or of the work of others whom I respect, even when the reviewers sometimes get it wrong. Reviewers must do what they do and readers surely understand that reviewers construct the meaning of the text they are reading in just the same way as all readers bring their own positions to bear on the words of the pages they are turning. However, since I take the publication of Geoff Whitty's long awaited volume, Sociology and School Knowledge (1985), as important and since I believe the book itself is a significant intervention into an ongoing debate about the politics of policy and practice in education, I want to add an American perspective -but one that I hope will not be limited to the "peculiarities of the Americans" (Hogan, 1982)-to the comments made by Lacy, Lawton and Sharp in the Review Symposium in Vol. 7, No. 1, 1986. In the process, I shall have to unpack the (sometimes unwarranted) assumptions that underlie some of their criticisms. In the space of an essay of this size, I cannot deal with all of my agreements and disagreements with the reviewers' arguments. What I shall do is select those that seem to me to be the most worthy of comment. Let me begin with some general observations about Whitty's recent book that account for my positive evaluation of it. There is no volume currently available that does a better job of reviewing the growth, and the conceptual, political, and ideological lacunae, of the new sociology of education and of critical work on the curriculum. So clearly has Whitty accomplished this that I have made the book, especially its first half, required reading for all of my graduate students in both curriculum studies and the sociology' of education. The way Whitty accomplished this is no small feat. American readers have grown rather cautious in approaching some British work. Here I shall speak bluntly and honestly. While critical sociologists of education in Britain have made considerable headway conceptually and politically, all too often their investigations have such involved theoreticisms, ones that often cover rather

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commonsensical points, that many Americans have learned that it takes a good deal of time to unpack the simple kernel from the overly 'complexified' covering. Also, some British work has been all too 'trendy', moving from theory to theory as each new wave of European (usually French) academic work washes up on the shores. Not enough time is taken to refine and use these theories in the interrogation of actual curricular and teaching policies and practices. Of course, Americans have more than their own share of trendy theorists; but there really may be a greater sense of the political importance of unmystified writing on the western side of the Atlantic. One of the reasons Sociology and School Knowledgewill be welcomed by many people in the United States and Canada who are part of, say, the critical curricular tradition is Whitty's obvious hard work in making complex political and conceptual issues clear. He has managed to do this without in the main sacrificing theoretical elegance in the process. Whitty has also attempted-successfully I believe-to apply this political and conceptual apparatus to concrete politics and tendencies involved in evaluation, in the "authoritarian populism" of the conservative restoration (Hall, 1980; Shor, 1986; Apple, 1987), and to counter-hegemonic possibilities in education. Finally, he has managed to do this in a way that is unusual for books that are politically involved. That is, while arguing from and for a leftist position, he has done so in a manner that is open and self-critical. This is critically important. As I have learned from nearly three decades of hard political work and nearly two decades of writing and speaking, such openness and honesty constitutes one of the most crucial elements in developing a base of support for leftist political positions. Yet such openness is not just important strategically. It is also significant theoretically, especially for those interested-as Whitty surely is-in the specificities of the economic, political, and cultural/ideological conditions underlying education as a material practice. Let me discuss this in somewhat more detail. In a field where work done under differing theoretical or ideological assumptions is often dismissed outright, Whitty's openness to other traditions is to be applauded. His willingness to entertain aspects of the neo-Weberian perspective is refreshing. Some neo-Marxists may be dismayed by such openness. But since we are not in a church, we should not worry about heresy. Our task is to understand and to act, and if such a process requires us to reconstruct parts of the received tradition, so be it. As Erik Olin Wright-surely no Weberian himself-reminds us, to deal with the complexity of real people in real institutions under capitalism, we need both Weberian and Marxist traditions (Wright, 1978, pp. 181-225). That is, we need to understand the bureaucratic structure of the State as a political form that acts in a dialectical manner with socio/economic and ideological determinants (Wright, 1978, p. 222). Weber may have been wrong on many crucially important issues, but he was not a fool. We are in danger of committing the genetic fallacy (i.e. the political position of a theorist unalterably pollutes all of her or his later work or work that comes out of that tradition, thereby making it imperative that we reject at every point any of her or his insights), and in the process we remain all too insulated from criticism. A paradigm case in point here is the criticism levelled against traditional Marxist interpretations by feminist authors. Many of their arguments have been devastating to orthodox Marxist assertions (Barrett, 1980), so much so that many people on the left believe that any attempt at understanding our social formation

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that does not combine in an unreductiveway analyses of class and gender together is only half a theory at best (Apple & Weis, 1983; Dale, Esland, Fergusson & MacDonald, 1981). The same, of course, needs to be said of race as well (Apple, 1987; Omi & Winant, 1987). The rejection of major aspects of the received orthodox Marxist tradition and the emerging sensitivity to the truly constitutive nature of gender and race demonstrate not a weakness but the continued growth and vitality of a tradition of critical analysis that is attempting to deal honestly and openly with the complexity of life under present conditions of domination and exploitation. In this regard, the arguments advanced by Stuart Hall, one of the most insightful writers on these issues, are essential. The task of critical theory is to produce as accurate a knowledge of complex social processes as the complexity of their functioning requires. It is not its task to console the left by producing simple but satisfying myths, distinguished only by their super-left wing credentials. (If the laws and tendencies of the capitalist mode of production can be stated in a simplified form because they are essentially simple and reducible, why on earth did Marx go on about them for so long-three incompleted volumes, no less?) Most important of all, these differences and complexities have real effects, which ought to enter into any serious calculations about how their tendencies might be resisted or turned. (Hall, 1981, p. 36) It is just this sense of complexity and real effects that I find refreshing in Whitty. While I would have wanted a greater recognition of non-class dynamics -in particular race and gender-in his analysis, his caution about the tendency toward economic reductionism that has plagued the left for decades and his ability to withstand the propensity to reject out of hand the insights from alternative theories mark a maturing of the leftist enterprise I believe. This is readily seen in other people's work as well, in particular in Bob Connell, whose non-marxist socialism (Connel, 1983), sensitivity to the real lives of students, teachers, and parents, and non-elitist style have struck a responsive chord with many individuals. If our analyses are to make a difference, and if they are to have a place in building a larger democratic movement, it is this very openness both in content and style that is necessary. This, of course, needs to be done in a manner that sacrifices neither the emancipatory intent of democratic socialism nor the conscious action against the oppressive conditions experienced by so many identifiable groups of people, but it is necessary nevertheless. There is more than a hint in Denis Lawton's otherwise relatively fair review that Whitty ought to face up to the fact that his sympathetic treatment of the neoWeberian position must mean a rejection of neo-Marxism. My own position on this, one developed in discussions with Stuart Hall and one that my discussions with Geoff Whitty lead me to believe he would accept, is that such a rejection is unwarranted. Unlike the neo-Weberian tradition, neo-Marxist work is organised around a set of fundamental positions that I find exceptionally insightful. One is the utter centrality of capitalism as a massively structuring force which has a major impact on every other structural relationship and antagonism. A second centers around the fact that such work wants to think through the determinations of social practice. No social practice takes place on an unstructured terrain. While I do not believe this always entails a strong sense of determinism, this remains one

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of the profound insights of the Marxist tradition. Thirdly, it is essential to continue to think through the problem of class and classes, even as we recognize the parallel power of gender and race. And fourthly, neo-Marxist work continues to provide a sense of the social totality, a sense of differences within a totalizing environment. Thus, to speak theoretically for a moment, one of its major foci is on the 'overdetermination' of and contradictions among practices in the economic, political, and cultural spheres. This was something I was at pains to demonstrate in Education and Power (1982, revised edition 1985) and it is clearly one of the orienting principles behind Sociologyand SchoolKnowledge. One of the criticisms made of Sociology and School Knowledgeis its lack of an elaborated program. It does not entail a "socialist curriculum". I too believe that it is crucial that we develop the principles and practices entailed in such a curriculum. In fact, there are few tasks of greater import than establishing what "really useful knowledge" for the majority of the population actually is. Yet the reviewers may have been too harsh here. Unlike other positions, a democratic curriculum is not a 'received' one. It is not established by a few and then channeled downwards so that the only real question left for the majority of people involved is how to implement it. To do so would be to mirror the dominant ways curricula are already too often dealt with today. 'We' shall decide what is important to know; 'you' will teach it or learn it (Apple, 1979, 1983, 1987). In contradistinction to this, a truly socialist curriculum-one that is democratic in more than a rhetorical sense-must be decided in exactly that way, democratically. Thus, it needs to be built deliberatively, out of the inevitable and time consuming conflicts and compromises that a consensual politics at the base requires (See Hinton, 1966, for an interesting set of possibilities). This means that while it may be helpful to have a broad outline of the political and pedagogic principles involved in such a curriculum established by people such as Whitty beforehand, there is a real danger if this is done too specifically. In the absence of participation of all persons involved, there can not be a genuinely socialist curriculum except in name only. This can be a source of criticism of the kind levelled at Whitty. I prefer, however, to think of it positively. By the very fact that there is a constitutive tension here between preordaining a curriculum (an act that would at least give groups of people ideas upon which to work) and having it built from the ground up in both its principles and practices (but which may not guarantee 'progressive' content and may be difficult to convince people to do in the absence of some general principles and working models that have already been built), the critically oriented educator must ponder the politics of her or his position. There simply is no other choice but to reflect deeply upon this tension. In few other traditions is this so powerfully the case. This recognition is clear in Sociologyand SchoolKnowledge.For Whitty, the task is for politically oriented teachers, labor, critical sociologists of the curriculum, and others to jointly build a program, each one cooperating and teaching the others. "In any future alliance between radical teachers and the labour movement, curriculum issues need to be matters of open discussion and collaboration from the start and sociologists of education could have a significant role to play in such development" (Whitty, 1985, p. 176). There are other weaknesses implied by the reviewers, one being Whitty's

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alleged failure to deal sufficiently with certain empirical investigations that might substantiate his or the new sociologists' claims. Yet, a close reading of Whitty's chapters reveals that he too is critical of the overall lack of 'empirical' work specifically employing the critical culturalist traditions that had their roots in some of the tendencies within the new sociology of education. One of his major points is that such work has been done more outside of Britain than inside. In the United States in particular the past decade has witnessed a flowering of attempts at understanding specific curricular histories, policies, and practices by linking them not only to internal educational relations but to the race, class, and gender dynamics of the larger social formation (See Apple & Weis, 1983; Christian, 1984; Teitelbaum, 1985; Everhart, 1983; Weis, 1985; Valli, 1986; McNeil, 1987). Surely, it is the search for this linkage that is the key. Lacy would have liked Whitty to include more of the work of, say, Ball, Hammersley, Goodson, and others. Some of this work is very well done indeed. It certainly deserves even greater recognition and might profitably have been mentioned. However, the unique integration of what might be called internalist and externalist analysis-with neither one of these being privileged over the other and both guided by the analytic categories generated out of a concern for more just structural relations-that some strands of the new sociology promised is found somewhat less in this work (though it is not totally absent to be sure) than in, for example, the more American and Australian studies Whitty points to (see, for instance, Connell, 1982, 1985). No author can include everything and Whitty's selection-given his interest in advancing a position based on sorting out the complex linkages between 'internal' and 'external'-seems judicious. I want to devote much of my attention in this last section of my response to Rachel Sharp's arguments. I shall do this for a number of reasons. First, I have always found her analyses provocative. She has historically been one of the most important figures in the sociology of education in pushing the field to recognize the socio/economic context in which not only schooling but the analyses of it as well operate. In my mind, this requires that she be taken very seriously. Secondly, she writes with obvious political commitment. In a time when so many forces conspire to transform education into merely a technical enterprise, to purge its history of political, economic, and cultural conflict from our collective memory, the importance of such political commitments cannot be denied. Finally, she is clear, an achievement that as I mentioned earlier is more unusual than we might like to admit. As I argue in considerably more detail in Teachersand Texts, all too much of the current crop of critical literature on education is so obtuse, so filled with neologisms, that it tends to embody a social relationship between author and reader nearly as elitist as the class elitism being overtly argued against in the literature itself (Apple, 1987). With Sharp, at least you know where she stands and what her arguments entail. With few exceptions, perhaps most notably Geoff Whitty, this is not as often the case as it should be. With all this said, however, this does not mean that many of her arguments against Whitty's book are correct. Behind Sharp's comments is a particular set of unarticulated assumptions. Among the most significant is the perception that the State has been, is, and can only be an "arm of capital". Thus, no struggles within it can be efficacious. Nearly all initiatives that have "transformative potential" have been incorporated by the capitalist State, "thereby subverting and dissipating their progressive potential" (Review Symposium, 1986, p. 100). Hence, only action outside the State matters.

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Sharp's arguments are a bit too close to the orthodox Leninist theory which held in essence that the only good bourgeois State is a dead one. Yet, since Gramsci's time, there has been a gradual but considerable movement away from this position (Carnoy, 1984, p. 257). Rather than the State being seen as totally controlled by capital, it is seen as riven with conflicts and contradictions (Dale, 1982; Apple, 1982). It is not simply an arm of capital, but a site of struggle. In both capitalist metropoles and in 'industrializing periphery countries' such as Brazil, Mexico, South Korea and elsewhere, the focus has shifted to the accentuation of these conflicts over the State and within it and to the building of social movements "that aim to control State apparatuses". In short, this shift points out the importance not only of the economic but the political as well. It emphasizes not only action in civil society against the State, but political action through and in the State as well (Carnoy, 1984, p. 258). In his thorough review of the recent gains made in our understanding of both how the State works and how one collectively builds democratic movements, Martin Carnoy summarizes the major points. Poulantzas in France, Offe in Germany, Ingrao and Bobbio in Italy, O'Connor, Castells, Wolfe, and others in the United States all argue for one form or another of change through capitalist democracy to expand mass power over resources already controlled by the State, and to expand mass political power itself through the contradictions implicit in the democratic process. Given the extensive involvement in the economy by the welfare State-even if that involvement is not necessarily in direct production-this kind of politics makes eminent sense. Since the State has become increasingly the primary source of dynamic for the monopoly-dominated capitalist economies, it is the State rather than production that should be and will be the principal focus of class conflict. And given the emphasis on expanding democracy, the State necessarily becomes the arena for that conflict. (Carnoy, 1984, p. 258) These points may be a bit overstated, but they provide insights that are in direct conflict with the more unilinear view held in Sharp. For if the State only 'coopts' democratic initiatives in education and in other spheres of social life, then any action for democracy in it is doomed to failure and is merely a sideshow to the 'real' struggles outside the State where the 'real' class struggle goes on. While I am not without some sympathy with this view-since it does remind us that this is capitalism and the State does depend on capital accumulation for its own revenues if for nothing else-it really is too mechanistic. It uses the rhetoric of class struggle without acknowledging the previous successes of such struggles on State policy itself. In so doing, rather than providing effective arguments against Whitty's position on the importance of acting within the State, as one arena of struggle, it tends to picture a history in which only capitalists have won victories in the State. The bulk of the population-women, labor, people of color (these groups are obviously not exclusive)-have been duped and have never gained anything of lasting substance. All is cooptation. Yet a more dynamic perspective on the history of the relationship between the State and class (to say nothing of gender and race) politics allows for a more accurate picture. By being the site in which the conflicts between what I have elsewhere called propertyrights and person rights are worked out, the State has

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progressive as well as retrogressive elements in it. Action on it and in it has served to mobilize social movements and has had no little degree of success (Apple, 1982, 1987; Omi & Winant, 1987; Piven & Cloward, 1982). Once again, Carnoy is helpful in summarizing many of these points. In the class struggle view, the class State can be moved against capitals' interests by the development of movements inside and outside the State to force it to move against its fundamental role as reproducer of class relations. This position suggests that such political action has already been successful and can continue to be so. The State is shaped by such movements: its functions are expanded and it takes increasing responsibility for capital accumulation and social peace. But the State will not reform in a progressive direction without such movements pressing it. In other words, the capitalist State is inherently class-based and will act in that way unless pressured by mass organizations. The correct political strategy is to organize at the base, both outside and inside the State, bringing those organizations to bear on society's dominant institutions to reform them. (Carnoy, 1984, p. 259) These points have importance in any discussion about the efficacy of educational action or any other on the terrain of the State itself since they provide a far more subtle theory (and provide for a far more dynamic politics than ultra-left rejectionism) than that hinted at in Rachel Sharp's response. I do not mean these to be taken as purely academic points. Sharp's criticisms of Whitty's stance-that action within the State (towards building a more vigorous left position within the Labour Party, action in the educational apparatus, in struggles over the reform of curricular policy and practice at the local, regional, and national levels, and so on) is not only necessary but can lead somewhere if organized around and with mass social movements-rests upon a particular position on the State itself. If this position can be shown to be weak or overly one sided, as I think it is, then it raises distinct questions about the foundations from which such criticisms arise. Of course, it is possible that Whitty may be too optimistic, that he does under-represent the utter power of capital; but I believe he is actually much closer to the historical record, to the power of real people to collectively and successfully struggle over the policies of the State than Sharp gives him credit for. Evidence for such successful struggles in both education and the larger State in the United States is clear (see, for example, Piven & Cloward, 1982; Cohen & Rogers, 1983; Hogan, 1985; Wrigley, 1982; Reese, 1986; Omi & Winant, 1987). I cannot but assume that it is possible to find evidence for a more dynamic interpretation in Britain as well. At the least, it should make one pause before accepting Sharp's provocative arguments prematurely. The State is contradictory. It has been neither the site of all losses nor the agent of total recuperation of all initiatives. To hold such a position is to assume that people have not organized, have not had victories, have only been puppets in the face of the unending machinations of the capitalist State. Once more, we must thank Sharp for doing what she does best-raising important issues, making us stop and think more seriously about the politics of the stances the left and educators in general have taken. Yet, in this instance, she may have overstated her case more than a little. Thus, I think Whitty has grounds enough to substantiate his claims. Certainly, any arguments against them need to

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be grounded both in the emerging and highly insightful literature on the State and in the formation of social movements on the terrain of the State by gender, race, and class actors. Absent such arguments, we have good reason to respond positively to Whitty's analysis, especially since I believe he has taken all these points into consideration and has thought long and hard about their implications. Let me conclude my response by saying that Sociologyand SchoolKnowledge is not a perfect book. Such a thing is probably an empirical impossibility in the first place. Yet it is a very good one, one that I believe makes a very real contribution. The quality of its arguments, its synthesis of not only British but American and Australian work, its openness and its clarity, all make it a volume worth reading, discussing, and taking seriously. Professor Michael Apple, Department of Curriculum and InstrucCorrespondence: tion, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Teacher Education Building, 225 North Mills Street, Madison, Wisconsin 53706, USA. REFERENCES
M.W. (1979) Ideologyand Curriculum(Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul). APPLE, APPLE, M.W. (1982) Educationand Power (Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul). APPLE, M.W. (1983) Curriculum in the year 2,000: tensions and possibilities, Phi Delta Kappan, 64, pp. 321-326. M.W. (1987) Teachersand Texts:a political economy APPLE, of class and genderrelationsin education(New York, Routledge & Kegan Paul). APPLE, M.W. & WEIS,L. (Eds) (1983) Ideologyand Practicein Schooling(Philadelphia, Temple University Press). M. (1984) The State and Political Theory(Princeton, Princeton University Press). CARNOY, L. (1984) Becoming a woman through romance, unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of CHRISTIAN, Wiconsin, Madison. COHEN, (New York, Penguin). J. & ROGERS, J. (1983) On Democracy R.W. (1982) Making the Difference(Boston, Allen & Unwin). CONNELL, R.W. (1983) Which Way is Up? (Boston, Allen & Unwin). CONNELL, R.W. (1985) Teachers'Work(Boston, Allen & Unwin). CONNELL, DALE,R. (1982) Education and the capitalist state: contributions and contradictions, in M.W. APPLE in Education (Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul). (Ed.) Cultural and EconomicReproduction
DALE, R., ESLAND, G., FERGUSON,R. & MACDONALD, M. (Eds) Education and the State, Vol. I: politics,

patriarchy,and practice (Barcombe, Falmer House). R. (1983) Reading, Writing and Resistance(Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul). EVERHART, HALL, S. (1980) Popular democratic vs. authoritarian populism: two ways of taking democracy (London, Lawrence & Wishart). seriously, in: A. HUNT(Ed.) Marxism and Democracy & R. BRUNT HALL,S. (1981) The whites of their eyes: racist ideologies and the media, in: G. BRIDGES (Eds) Silver Linings: somestrategies for the eighties (London, Lawrence & Wishart). W. (1966) Fanshen (New York, Vintage). HINTON, D. (1982) Education and class formation: the peculiarities of the Americans, in M.W. APPLE HOGAN, in Education (Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul). (Ed.) Cultural and EconomicReproduction D. (1985) Class and Reform(Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press). HOGAN, McNEIL,L. (1987) Contradictions of Control(New York, Routledge & Kegan Paul). H. (1987) Racial Formationin the United States (New York, Routledge & Kegan OMI, M. & WINANT, Paul).
PIVEN, F.F. & CLOWARD,R. (1982) The New Class War (New York, Pantheon).

W. (1986) Politics and the Promiseof SchoolReform(New York, Routledge & Kegan Paul). REESE, REVIEW SYMPOSIUM (1986) on Geoff Whitty, Sociologyand SchoolKnowledge,BritishJournal of Sociology of Education, 7, pp. 88-101. SHOR,I. (1986) Culture Wars (New York, Routledge & Kegan Paul).

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K. (1985) Schooling for good rebels, unpublishedPh.D. thesis, University of Wisconsin, TEITELBAUM, Madison. VALLI,L. (1986) BecomingClerical Workers (New York, Routledge & Kegan Paul). WEIS,L. (1985) Between Two Worlds(Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul). WRIGLEY, J. (1982) Class Politics and Public Schools(New Brunswick, Rutgers University Press). WHITrY, G. (1985) Sociologyand School Knowledge(London, Methuen). E.O. (1978) Class, Crisis and the State (London, New Left Books). WRIGHT,

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