Recently, a range of educational theorists have explored and extended upon popular currents in political theory through articulating "open" and "unknowing" pedagogies. Such contributions represent a radical turn away from the presumed "universals" found in proclamations of justice and emancipation and, ultimately, the centering of class analysis.…

In this essay, Nancy Vansieleghem starts from the observation that parents nowadays are addressed as individuals in need of parental expertise and advice. She maintains that the notion that we are living in a permanently changing society has created a context in which parents feel that they no longer "know" what is good or bad for their children.…

Due to a number of radical changes in society, the role of parents in the upbringing of their children has been redefined. In this essay, Paul Smeyers argues that "risk" thinking, and the technologization that goes with it in the context of child rearing, naturally leads to the rights discourse, but that thinking about the relation between parents…

Daniel Bell's theories about post industrial society are critiqued, and their relevance for educational theorizing is questioned. Educational theorists should not uncritically accept ideas arising in other areas of the social sciences, but should establish their own structure based on philosophy, science, and humanism. (PP)

An alternative is presented to counter current radical arguments that the schools cannot bring about social change because they are instruments of capitalism. The works of Samuel Bowles, Herbert Gintis, and Louis Althusser are discussed. Henry Giroux's "Ideology, Culture and the Process of Schooling" provides an alternative to cynicism.…