In this essay, I differentiate between coercive and confrontive kinds of power assertion to elucidate the significantly different effects on children's well-being of authoritarian and authoritative styles of parental authority. Although both parenting styles (in contrast to the permissive style) are equally demanding, forceful, and…

The win-win approach to solving conflicts, which has become popular in the business world, should be a natural for the school environment. Win-win thinking can foster a cooperative school climate by meeting educators' and students' needs for dignity, belonging, and respect. Yet win-win thinking faces a number of obstacles in schools, writes…

This paper interrogates the relationship between the social distance men have from children, fear, and the social expectation that men will be capable of managing student (mis)behaviours. Briefly, the central argument is that the social distance men, as a group, have from children, and child protection concerns of men working with children can…

Over forty years ago, Howard Zinn identified the problem as not one of civil disobedience, but of civil "obedience". He confronted the problem of remaining obedient to laws and rules even "in the face of the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war and cruelty." Framed in an early childhood context, this article explores the value of…

The intent of this article is to explore how No Child Left Behind (NCLB) emerges from a discursive frame that is also used in relation to neoliberal corporate conquests and, significantly, America's war on terror. The article first demonstrates through reference to online resistance discourses and NCLB, how NCLB is a product of and reproduces the…

Responds to Peter Hobson's assertions concerning the relationship of punishment and moral education. Draws upon the writings of Michael Foucoult in suggesting that punishment in the legal sense does not fit well with efforts to develop rational autonomy. Suggests that traditional talk of punishment obscures the reality of practice. (KO)

In his "Rethinking Domination and Resistance: Challenging Postmodernism" ("Educational Researcher," January-February, 2004), Aaron Schutz questioned what he saw as postmodernism's fascination with the workings of pastoral modes of control, a preoccupation that prevents postmodernists from locating and opposing the disciplinary controls experienced…

Contrasts Richard Peters' widely accepted analysis and justification of teacher authority with Nell Keddie's discussion of classroom knowledge. Contends that Peters' justification relies upon contrafactual presuppositions about what a teacher knows and teaches. Argues that authority, supposedly based on superior knowledge, is in fact an extension…

Discusses how to establish a balance between classroom discipline and education, noting the significance of the development of student character and examining the need to prepare preservice and inservice teachers to resolve the conflict between teacher authority and student liberty. The curriculum of the Jefferson Center for Character Education…

Michel Foucault sought to understand how and why it is that people in the West, in their arduous and incessant search for truth, have also built into and around themselves intricate and powerful systems intended to manage all that they know and do. While little of Foucault's work directly concerns itself with the historically recent phenomenon of…

One challenge for composition instructors is to determine exactly, or even approximately, what objects and rituals must be observed for students' words to fall with the "true." Another is to successfully communicate these objects and rituals to their students through the various techniques of discipline. The arbitrary nature of…

Court decisions enlarging the rights of pupils are eroding legitimate adult authority in the schools. (Author)

This report focuses on the activities of school advocacy groups in the area of school discipline. It concludes that the advocacy approach, while not always appropriate, is the most desirable for problems which neither conventional school programs nor relatively new conflict resolution mechanisms adequately address. (Author/RLV)

Uses Michel Foucault's concepts of disciplinary technology and panopticism to explain educational inequalities. Describes the Panopticon (an architectural prototype for prisons) as a form of disciplinary technology. Considers schools as technologies of power and discipline, with their conformity to this model contributing to today's social…

Teachers' attempts to establish and maintain authority in their classrooms give rise to one of the essential tensions of teaching: reconciling caring and controlling. This paper examines sociopolitical questions about the nature of classroom authority and the uses of power to understand this tension. The first part presents an overview of the…