Monday, May 09, 2011

Knowledge and Power

I am going to start considering an issue of my own research here -- the relationship between knowledge and power. To start this series of entries, I wanted to set out the terrain of the discussion. In a couple of papers I'm working on, I argue that one of the key projects of neoliberalism is to constrict or delimit the knowledge that is available to the public. I will expand on these ideas in coming posts, but here are the main arenas I'm considering:

1. K-12: the move to a focus on standards and testing is severely constricting what knowledge is focused on in schools (predominantly basic skills). Not only does this move away from more holistic notions of education, but severely limits spaces for creativity and true critical thinking. This is coupled with the tendency to focus schooling almost exclusively on economics and global competitiveness, legitimating the new global order and the training and sorting functions of schooling. And it is backed by the notion that teaching and teacher education can be improved through rationality and science, and that diversity and social justice are anathema to contemporary aims.
2. At the university level, similar pushes are underway. First is the attack on radical, or even progressive professors, through a number of channels. Second, is the push to vocationalize higher education, thus pushing its focus toward training high skilled workers and away from the humanities and any attempt to transform society or question entrenched knowledge. Third, it involves attempts to impose accountability and standards in college classes (together with increasing class size in many universities) -- taking away professor's autonomy. And crises are used in both cases to solidify these imperatives, by draining funding from any non-value-added programs and departments (e.g., those associated with liberal arts education and the humanities).
3. In the media and public sphere, there is a push toward "objectivity" that involves the contention that reporters are only supposed to report the news, not analyze it or hold those making news accountability for the truthfulness of their claims. I reported on the attacks against Anderson Cooper for calling Mubarek a liar -- which might have crossed the line a little, but can't the media take any position anymore? One wonders what happened to the spirit Woodward and Bernstein once inspired in the mainstream media to challenge entrenched power?
4. This is part of an overall perspective that certain types of knowledge are implicitly dangerous. In shifting the elites from those with money and power to professors, conservatives played on the hubris of too many leftists. They backed this with their reactionary project and a closed-mindedness to any alternatives. But I believe it exists among progressives and on the left as well -- as for example supporting free speech but trying to block speakers they don't like from college campuses and other forums. Parents and the general public too have fallen prey to this ideology -- that politics can and should be eliminated from education and the news. There seems to be a general meme that instrumental rationality should dominate not only education but all public policy -- with experts the sole determinant of decision-making.

Some initial thoughts that I will expand upon in the coming weeks ...

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