Theory and Research in Education

The recent ban of ‘conspicuous’ religious symbols in French state schools has received international attention, especially the uncertainty of whether Muslims will comply with the ban. The issue, however, raises a number of philosophical dilemmas regarding toleration in a liberal democracy, the notion of a ‘neutral’ public space in state schools and the protection of girls’ rights in traditional communities. I examine each issue accordingly and argue that the French state is unjustified in banning religious symbols.

This article analyzes the zero-reject policy at the core of American special education law from the standpoint of morality, by examining the policy in terms of the following three moral theories: utilitarianism, Rawlsian Kantianism (justice as fairness) and neo-Aristotelianism, as developed recently by Martha Nussbaum in her capabilities account of social justice.Although on first impression, none of these theories seems to provide a framework within which to develop a plausible defense of the zero-reject policy, on deeper analysis there are plausible arguments in support of the policy from the perspectives of all three theories. The analysis supporting this conclusion leads to an enhanced appreciation of the conceptual resources that major philosophical theories of morality provide to understand the moral bases of the most important educational rights, under American special education law, of children with severe to profound physical and cognitive disabilities.

Drawing on published feminist literature, this essay deconstructs developmentalism as a metanarrative that contributes to the oppression and exploitation of women and underpins educational practice. First, I examine feminist critiques of developmentalism, distinguishing between ‘insider critiques’ formulated by feminist psychologists evaluating and trying to improve traditional theories of human development and ‘outsider critiques’ articulated by feminists, both within and outside psychology, challenging science itself. Second, I address educational implications of the insider and outsider critiques of developmentalism. Educational reforms spawned by insider feminist critiques consist largely of efforts to make curriculum and pedagogy more ‘girl-friendly’. Reforms aligned with outsider feminist critiques call for ‘critique-friendly’ schooling that provides opportunities for reconceptualizing gender dualisms, critiquing school practices that strengthen dualisms and ongoing critique of educational reforms initiated in the name of such critiques. Following the outside critiques, I argue for feminist learning communities with authentic relationships between teachers and students whose diverse and changing identities and ideas are respectfully and compassionately acknowledged.

This article is an attempt to make an empirical contribution to a more grounded model of thinking about justice. It focuses on the work of one practitioner working in an inner-London local education authority with a remit relating to the achievement of ‘African-Caribbean’ students. In describing the challenges that she faces in the course of her work and how she responds to them, we want to illuminate the contribution that this kind of practice-focused analysis can make to understandings of what social justice is, how tensions in social justice arise, and how they might be responded to.

It is generally supposed that a curriculum should engage students with worthwhile knowledge, which requires an understanding of what it means for something to be worthwhile: a substantive conception of the good. Yet a number of influential curriculum theories deny or undermine one or another aspect of the key assumption upon which a meaningful account of the good depends - that people are the agents of their own beliefs, desires and actions. This renders a significant encounter between the curriculum and substantive ethics highly problematic. In this article I explore the meeting between curriculum and human agency in four seminal curriculum theories, and offer a framework to engage the curriculum with this key concept of substantive ethics.