Social justice in education in 'new times'

This thesis considers social justice in education in ‘new times’. To facilitate the investigation a number of research questions were pursued. These questions were: • What is meant by the label ‘social justice’? • How is social justice to be understood in contemporary terms? • Are there tensions between traditional and contemporary views of social justice? • How effective are policy developments in delivering social justice via education? • What difference do such policies make at the local level? To answer these questions a critical case analysis of a country community and one of its primary schools was carried out. Data were gathered using a variety of methods. As a researcher who was also a teacher in the school I kept a personal professional journal during 1993 and 1994. During this period I was the teacher in the school with responsibility for curriculum development related to issues of social justice. In 1994 I conducted interviews with twenty students, parents and teachers at the school in relation to social justice issues. I also interviewed the CEO of the town’s Council. A number of relevant Federal and State Government and school policy documents were consulted and an archival search of the local newspaper from 1956 to 1994 was undertaken. Statistical information from the Australian Bureau of Statistics as well as from school records was used. A number of local history books were consulted as well as the minutes of relevant school committee meetings. Contemporary social theory, more specifically the work of Anthony Giddens, provided the major methodological tool. Giddens structuration theory was selected as it provided a way of interpreting society from both macro and micro perspectives, it provided a way of studying the interconnectedness of the individual and society. In addition to this, a metaphor was used as a way of developing an understanding of the data. The river was chosen as the metaphor as it has significance to the case study community and it also provides a way of understanding interconnectedness. At an interpretive level, both social theory and moral philosophy were drawn on, including the work of Geoffrey Sharp, Anthony Giddens and Alisdair MacIntyre. A review of selected literature indicated three main areas of concern in relation to this thesis. We live in a time of constant and ongoing change, understanding how this change impacts on the lives of individuals and society is important. Such an understanding relates directly to issues of ontology. In addition it was necessary to consider schools in these ‘new times’. The literature revealed that the changes occurring in the wider society were related to the changes currently being seen in schools. Specifically this related to the increasing emphasis on economics and on individualism, emphases also reflected in the findings of this thesis. Finally the literature related to social justice was discussed, the focus here was on distributive theories of justice and the way these are reflected in programs such as the DSP. The data, as expressed in the metaphor of the flowing river, revealed dominant and marginal currents in social justice in education in ‘new times’. The dominant social group are the intellectually trained and the dominant issues were related to technology, globalisation and economic and bureaucratic rationalism. In the marginal currents we find the under-employed and the unemployed and marginal issues relating to housing, the black economy, poverty and the survival of rural communities. The data also revealed a marginal tributary running into the river. This tributary shows that social cohesion is still a part of life in ‘new times’, albeit a marginalised part. The dominant and marginal currents in social justice in ‘new times’ reveal changes at a deep cultural level. Social justice in ‘new times’ is set within the limits provided by economic rationalism. Such a position is closely linked to the rise of liberal democracy as a political ideology. A rise which has been on a global scale. This valorizes the individual as compared with the group, and the family as compared to the social whole, within the context of expanded economic groupings and markets. Such an ideological position sees the role of the state as providing the ‘legitimising muscle’ to advance the cause of individuals and their families as compared to larger social groupings. These perceptions were applied in Australia, even under a Labor Government. In this sense social justice policies in ‘new times’ are ideological, they act as a political lever to legitimate economic restructuring. They are policies designed to carry disparate groups forward and together on a common wave of economic reform. They are used to ‘sell’ economic reform as being ‘good’ for all of society. Against the backdrop of economic rationalism and liberal democratic ideals there emerges a language geared to the production of an economically viable self, self image, self identity, self esteem and self confidence. As a result, the sense of identity as ‘social’ is lost from view. This thesis argues that what is needed is a new way of looking at social justice in education. A way that reaches beyond the solutions forwarded by the political Left and the Right. It is about the development of an understanding of the way in which an assimilation of the hyper individual and the social group can result in the emergence of the socially responsible individual. This is a cultural shift that sees the individual/society dualism presented in a new way. The categories enter into a new relationship where the balance shifts away from the individual towards society. A shift to a culture where the individual’s rights and responsibilities are respected within a social whole. Such a cultural shift would result in a curriculum which would build social identity, promoted socially responsible independent thought and make space for creativity and the aesthetic. A ‘curriculum for social responsibility’ would be a socially just curriculum.

As fire burns : functional work and praxis in ontology

The context: the historical and philosophical demise of the Marxist model of praxis as a unity of theory and practice organized by a Party in service of a Cause. The task: to remodel praxis by distinguishing it from functional work. The proving ground: the discourse of ontology. The thesis works through four types of ontology in its attempt to construct different ontological schemas for praxis and functional work. In the first three ontologies, Platonic, Aristotelian and relativist, ontological impasses occur in the accounts of the relation between one and the multiple, and of the existence of order. They prevent the successful construction of a schema for functional work. It is in the set-theory ontology of Alain Badiou that the means arise for the passage through these impasses and the definitive construction of distinct ontological schemas for functional work and praxis. This results in a new concept of praxis and a multiplication of its domains beyond politics to science, art and love

Reflective positioning : the impact of conversations in the social and cultural environment of midwifery practice settings on professional learning for students

Literature reviews on the topic of reflection and reflective practice encompassed midwifery, nursing, medicine, allied health, education and professional education. This investigation also included socio-psychological theories by leading authors such as Benner (nursing), Schön (professional education) and positioning theory by Harré and others. Positioning is a psycho-sociological ontology in which individuals metaphorically position themselves within three entities: people, institutions, and societies, where conversations are constructed and make an impact upon the social world. The social and cultural structures and interactions developed in Archer’s morphogenesis were examined in terms of the impact of possible encounters and the transformational effects of learning experiences in practice settings. These bodies of work provided the theoretical framework for the author’s research of students’ experiences in midwifery education for postgraduate students from which selected excerpts with three participating students and their supervising midwives are presented. These excerpts are related to reflective practices and the professional conversations conducted between students and midwives. It was found that reflective positioning applied in midwifery education by students can serve as an analytical tool in explaining social and cultural elements of clinical placements to influence and transform their learning. The potency of conversations that occur in everyday moment-to-moment interactions do contribute to students’ induction in professional midwifery practice and their identity formation as a midwife.

The relevance of perspectivism to the task of modularisation in ontology development

An ontology development methodology seeks to provide developers with established principles, processes, practices, methods and activities for developing ontologies (Gasevic et al., 2009). Diverse methodologies have been published for the development of ontologies, and have evolved, based on the diverse experiences of researchers and practitioners, and the development teams who surveyed the benefits and shortcomings of the available methodologies in order to determine the applicability of methodologies to particular contexts. An evaluation of existing ontology development methodologies has identified that the concept formulation process is not well defined, or based on rigorous processes (Castro et al., 2006; Winters & Tolk, 2009). In order for the validity of the social realism of the actors in a social setting to be captured, the perspectives of each actor needs to be acknowledged and incorporated into the concept formulation process / framework. This paper demonstrates how consideration of perspectivism leads to a meaningful modularisation of the resultant ontology.

Merleau-Ponty, naturalism and phenomenological ontology

 Dr Pollard’s thesis is entitled: Merleau-Ponty, Naturalism and Phenomenological Ontology.

Legal systemology and the geopolitics of Roman law: a response to Stuart Elden’s critique of Carl Schmitt’s spatial ontology

This paper explores the production, destruction, and reproduction of the geopolitical spaces of Roman law in order to offer an analysis of Schmitt’s (selective) notion of Jus Publicum Europaeum and its relevance to the current “depoliticization” and “dejuridification” of the world. By adopting a historical and geopolitical approach that reaches the boundaries of legal systemology and political theology, the present contribution investigates the manipulative and instrumentalist use of the material object of Rome’s (universalist) competence, namely the “territory” as dominium of its political intervention, which was ultimately (and idealistically) aimed at avoiding the natural destiny of any living being: birth, maturity, and death. Attention is therefore paid to the Roman strategy of (ontological?) contamination of its mythical identity through the legal and sociopolitical administration and regulation of its geographical spaces in terms of (non-)cultural signification. Through the analysis of such concepts as “nomos,” “Großraum,” “Ortung,” and “Ordnung,” it is claimed that Schmitt voluntarily chose to identify the Jus Publicum Europaeum with the geopolitical order produced during the Age of Discovery and not with the “comprehensive” Roman spatial order. The reason for this choice may be identified in the distortive use of Rome’s social relations and political allegiances that lay at the core of its genealogical expansionism (and subsequent inevitable dissolution) since the conquest of Veius in 396 BC and the historical compromise between patrician nobility and plebeians in 367 BC.

Defending Nietzsche from Heidegger's Nietzsche: an analysis and critique of Heidegger's understanding of Nietzsche's ontology and epistemology

Daniel Connell's thesis analysed Martin Heidegger's ontological and epistemological critique of Nietzsche in his later writings. It argued that Heidegger's understanding of Nietzsche is flawed, and presented an alternative account of Nietzsche's ontology and epistemology.