Comparative Education Bulletin - Faculty of Education - The ...

interact with knowledge and its sociological structures. I thus explore
these theories in the said order: structure-related, agency-oriented
(and their middle-ground structuration theories), and discourseled
theories. A common thread among the theories examined here is
their critical stance: they challenge the functionalist view of schools
as well-intended and largely altruistic, benevolent institutions that
contribute to a harmonious society. Rather, critical theorists view social
institutions and the knowledge they create as sites of political struggle
and stratification. Divergent epistemologies – realist versus subjectivist
– underlie the theories discussed here. I map the six theorists selected
here for discussion on Figure 2 along two axes: the epistemological
and the structure/agency dimension. I explore them in pairs, starting
from the macro-structure oriented theories up to the micro-agency and
discourse-oriented theories.
Among the social theories that focus on the structural shaping
of knowledge, there is Mannheim’s (1997 [original 1936]) relationist
or perspectivist theory of knowledge. He argues that all theories and
cultural phenomena need to be understood in their social and historical
context, and that ideas and beliefs are rooted in larger thought
systems (dominant worldview or Weltanschauungen). From Mannheim
onwards, the sociology of knowledge has attacked the ‘objectivist’
idea of knowledge as ‘truth’ external to or independent of the social
processes of knowledge formation (“Mannheim” in Encyclopedia of
Social Theory).
Exhibiting some similarities to Mannheim in his emphasis on structure
and context is Toulmin’s (1972) theory of ‘intellectual ecology’. Toulmin’s
main thesis is his idea of rationality as being “concerned far more directly
with matters of function and adaptation – with the substantive needs
and demands of the problem-situations that men’s collective concepts
and methods of thought are designed to handle – than it is with formal
considerations” (p.vii). He adopts patterns of analysis of scientific thought
that are more historical, more empirical and more pragmatic. He offers
a political theory of the scientific professions, situating the analysis on
three levels (1972, pp.267-268): (1) the ‘common good’ represented by the
historical development of the collective discipline; (2) the professional
institutions of the enterprise; and (3) all the individual scientists who
struggle to combine the ideal demands of their chosen discipline and
the practical realities of their professional situation. His explanatory
framework offers a clear historical account of how intellectual,
institutional, and individual factors interact; and how, in the course
of pursuing their own legitimate interests, individual scientists and
scientific institutions can at the same time promote the ‘common good’
of their collective disciplines (p.268).
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