The New Servants of Power

CHRISTINE SHEA is currently a center fellow at the North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching. Her research area is the history of twentieth-century school and social reform movements. She is currently completing work on a social history of the Progressive-era mental hygiene movement.

This is an important book because its focus is critical, and its aim is to demystify the prevailing ideology of school reform. Perhaps never has the argument been greater than now for democracy and the restoration of human subjectivity and agency, two very important aspects of this collection of critical essays. The introductory essay is excellent in its elucidation of the world political economy of the 1980s and current educational reforms. It sets a clear direction for the remainder of the book, which is noteworthy for its organiational, conceptual, and written clarity. Topics include education reform and work, teacher education, continuing education, and equity. In its attempt to present alternative ways of seeing and interpreting educational/social phenomenon, this book is one of the best to appear. The text is refreshingly free of a lot of jargon; thus the reader is better able to understand the complexities of educational and social critique. Highly recommended for upper-level undergraduate and graduate reading as well as academic library acquisition. Choice