Fraser, James W. (1997). Reading, Writing, and Justice: School Reform as if Democracy Really Matters. Reviewed by Jerry D. Johnson, Ohio University

Fraser, James W. (1997). Reading, Writing, and Justice: School Reform as if Democracy Really Matters. Albany: State University of New York Press 248pp + xvi $19.95         ISBN 0-7914-3406-0 Reviewed by Jerry D. Johnson Ohio University April 10, 2000         Fraser's book is a volume in the series Interruptions: Border Testimonies and Critical Discourses, edited by Henry A. Giroux. The series title is an apt description of the methodology employed in Reading, Writing, and Justice, a critical discourse on school reform written from a standpoint that construes school reform as a series of skirmishes in an ideological border war.         Given this intent, Fraser takes a step back from commonplace questions about how to do school reform, reframing those questions within the context of two assumptions: 1) that equity is the central tenet of democracy and 2) that schools are the institutions responsible for effecting change to further the ideals of democracy. In consideration of these assumptions, Fraser sets out to show the reader what "democratic schooling" can and should look like, using as cases in point the issues of technology in schools and teacher education. The result, for the most part, is simply a further demarcation of the borders. Fraser neither suggests compelling ways to cross nor offers viable proposals on which to base a truce.         The argument begins with a question—"what are schools for?"—and offers two possible answers: schools can serve the needs of the existing society or schools can question existing structures and work to build a new society. For Fraser, the choice to serve the needs of the existing society perpetuates and exacerbates the inequalities inherent in a capitalist state. Grounded in a Deweyian view of democracy, the second choice advances social justice and promotes the redistribution of wealth. Examined within the framework of this dichotomy, Fraser sees today's debates over school reform as nothing less than a "struggle for the nation's soul" (p. xiv).         There is a danger in this choice of metaphor, a danger that the argument will devolve to mere rhetoric. In literature, battles for a human being's soul take the form of allegorical struggles between good and evil. Allegories of this sort simplify contested issues in an effort to delineate opposing sides; they lead to one-dimensional characters and a winner-take-all conclusion. With few exceptions, good wins and evil loses. No work of literature, Fraser's argument nevertheless heads in this direction.         Fraser superimposes a dichotomy of purpose (school as maintainer versus school as change agent) on specific issues within the discourse on school reform, illuminating two opposing sides easily discernible as "good" and "evil:" Are schools primarily for the expansion of democracy and economic opportunity for all or are schools primarily for sorting and classifying citizens, separating the future winners from the future losers. (p. 20) For one side, the professional status and authority to make curricular and management decisions regarding the best ways to prepare students to find their place in today's competitive market economy, albeit a place in which they can contribute and be productive citizens, is the goal. For others, however, empowerment is for quite different ends; ends that include teachers becoming, and recruiting their students to join them, as transformative intellectuals, ready to attack much in today's economy and able to play a central role in the fight for democracy. (p. 185).         His views about which side of the dichotomy represents goodness and light (in practical terms, democracy) and which side represents evil and darkness (unchecked capitalism and social injustice) are apparent throughout the book, as the following examples illustrate: We must look clearly at our whole society and the diversity of peoples who are here, and then rather than accept things as they are and call on the schools to prepare students to live in this world as it is with all its inequities and unhappiness, to instead project a better social order and try to live up to it. (p. 69) Is the purpose of schooling only to produce a new generation of citizens capable of working hard enough and creatively enough to put this nation back on top of the world economy? Or are we talking about a new generation which—in their ability to control their own lives and give voice to their deepest aspirations—will lead the United States not only to prosperity but may also lead this nation to be a voice for justice and democracy for all citizens of this country and for the people of this planet. (p. 122) If this is done, then public education will be more than a training ground for jobs, it will be one of the places where fundamental discussions about the best shape of future economic policy will take place ... it [public education] will be more than a training ground of voters, it will be one of the places in which people model what it means to live together and talk with each other with respect and with mutual commitments to a larger social good. (p. 127).         The lines are clearly drawn, and at this point the argument veers precariously close to emotionally charged generalities. The reader is put on the spot, feeling compelled by the rhetoric to answer the question, "which side are you on?" Fraser concedes that he and his fellow progressives and critical theorists too often force complex issues into dichotomies. Their inability to move beyond what Giroux and McLaren have termed "the language of critique" (p. 166), moreover, has kept them from having a significant influence on either public policy or public practices. Rather, it has tended to crowd progressives toward the margins of the debates over school reform and other issues related to social justice.         Fraser does, however, take a short step beyond the "language of critique" by posing a vision of what schooling might become. Because this vision seems to describe school practice that is the complete opposite of what currently exists, its success in presenting a workable alternative is questionable. Like many critics on the left, Fraser rests his program for school reform on the unlikely possibility that those in power would want to make the sorts of thoroughgoing changes that would support schooling as a form of human liberation. This assumption interferes with Fraser's ability to offer a credible proposal for school reform, and, as a result, his argument is best judged on the strength of its critique rather than on the merits of its program.         Drawing largely on Reich's The Work of Nations (1991) and Aronowitz and DeFazio's The Jobless Future (1994), Fraser's critique depicts an American society in which the rich are becoming much richer and the poor significantly poorer. Furthermore, Fraser argues, school reform initiatives of the 1980s and 1990s have been driven by a national preoccupation with economic decline in the world market coupled with an overly simplistic understanding of the causal relationship between education and the economy. The result has been to position the development of human capital as the ultimate goal of education, a trick of rhetoric that tends to shift blame for economic decline onto the schools.         Understandably, Fraser takes exception to this approach, and he expresses his disagreement by unpacking the argument that education is responsible for the economic crisis. This analysis rests on Fraser's answer to the question "what is really happening to the American economy?" Basing his answer on Reich's work, Fraser describes the globalization of the economy and the changing nature of jobs. Adding his own interpretation, Fraser considers the ways that race and gender issues, foreign policy, the decline of organized labor, and the lingering effects of the Cold War have produced changes in the US economy. He presents a compelling portrait of an economy not so much undergoing decline as undergoing an accelerating process of polarization between the haves and the have-nots.         Continuing the argument that schools are not the primary cause of the declining standard of living for many Americans, Fraser explores the relationship between schooling, democracy, and capitalism. Fraser's conceptualization of democracy follows Dewey's, and for Dewey "the social divisions of industrial capitalism are incompatible with the ethics of democracy" (p. 9). This perspective suggests that, under capitalism, social divisions will not only exist but will also widen (Marx's "What the bourgeoisie produces, above all else, are its own gravediggers"). Furthermore, this view implies that schools geared toward preparing students for the existing workforce have been successful from the standpoint of the elite while being destructive from the standpoint of the majority. Put simply, the capitalist economy has driven education, producing an educational system that serves capitalism fairly well. What Fraser calls for, in defiance of service to capitalism, is an educational system that, through both its practices and its product, drives the economy in ways that are more democratic.         Fraser's Deweyian democracy is not the democracy of mainstream America. His version of democracy goes well beyond widely accepted notions of participation through voting and equal rights under the law. It is a radical conceptualization that is geared towards providing for the inclusion of all in both the processes of defining the "good society" and in receiving the benefits of that society. It demands equal access and equity of outcomes. Schooling, as conceptualized here, has as its primary purpose helping to bring about this type of democracy.         Moreover, for Fraser, democratic education is multicultural education: "to talk of democracy in the United States at the end of the twentieth century is to talk of multiculturalism" (p. 65). On the subject of multiculturalism, Fraser proclaims, "there is more to be done than challenging the assertions of the right ... a new scholarship of diversity and difference needs to emerge" (p. 83). Unfortunately, that scholarship does not emerge in this work. The assertions of the right are challenged, and challenged as vehemently as they are intelligently—with academic racism, the controversy surrounding political correctness, and "angry white maleness" as the primary targets—but the alternatives to the right are presented in ideas at once general and utopian. A statement like, "in the process of building a new multiethnic/multiracial culture for this nation all people and all cultures must contribute" (p. 66) is not likely to have a significant impact on public policy or public practice.         Fraser, however, appears to have anticipated this line of criticism: Building a vision of an open and inclusive democracy in the United States is utopianism at its best, but it also very practical. Educational dialogue needs to be practical. But it is also true that the desire to be practical, to be immediately relevant, has impoverished our dialogue and kept us from larger goals and larger visions. (p. 91)         The argument is circular, a logical fallacy: utopian theorizing about education is practical because, in the past, our overwhelming desire to be practical has kept us from properly theorizing about things utopian. Logical fallacies and utopianism aside, the chapter in which this passage appears devotes far more attention to unpacking the claims of the right than it does to building a new vision. This unpacking is important, even necessary, but it does not offer substantive contributions to the book's stated aim of redefining the role of schools in a postindustrial capitalist state.         What attention is focused on building this new vision begins with the assertion, "multicultural education must move to the very heart of the educational enterprise" (p. 65). This assertion is the concluding statement in a logical sequence including the claims: "the primary purpose of education in a democratic society is democracy" (p. xi) and "to talk of democracy in the United States at the end of the twentieth century is to talk of multiculturalism" (p. 65).         Elaborating, Fraser discusses the character of an educational enterprise with multiculturalism at its heart. This discussion is amorphous. It links educational concerns to the broader issue of national culture as it manifests (or should manifest) itself in a culturally diverse democratic state: "a multicultural approach is not just adding stories at the margins of the curriculum. It involves a complete rethinking and retelling of the nation's cultural narrative" (p. 67). National culture and school curricula are inseparable in this conceptualization; they should operate in tandem, each shaping and being shaped by the other in a circular fashion. This relationship seems at once interesting to consider and improbable, given the strength of localism and the association between locale and ethnicity in the United States. Moreover, this view seems to propose an exalted role for education. The major problem with this conceptualization, however, is that it operates at such a macroscopic level of theorizing about education and society that the resulting call to action can be read as no more than a generalized directive to go left instead of right.         The two cases in point—technology in schools and teacher education—suffer in similar ways because of Fraser's tendency to dichotomize rather than to explore complexity. Good and evil, and the ideological border between them, continue to be the focus. Fraser's argument again emphasizes criticism, working to clarify positions on opposing sides of the issues. In the case of teacher education, he does eventually propose some kind of action, but that proposal is little more than a plea to the intelligentsia of the left to move beyond critical theory toward engagement with the public debate on educational policy.         Technology in schools fits neatly into Fraser's dichotomy of purpose, perhaps better than any other issue. He finds it easy to demonstrate that the instructional use of computers can exacerbate the inequities that exist among schoolchildren (i.e., wealthy schools often have better computers and lower student-to-workstation ratios). Moreover, for Fraser, it is arguable, if not demonstrable, that computers can play a significant role in bridging gaps between the haves and the have-nots. The key question, according to Fraser, is not "should computers be used?" but rather "how should computers be used?" To support his position, Fraser again turns to Dewey, who in 1929 commented upon that period's technological innovation for schools, the radio: "The enemy is not material commodities, but the lack of will to use them as instruments for achieving preferred possibilities" (p. 143).         Fraser's recommendations for the instructional uses of computers are directed towards the key issues of access and instructional strategies. From his perspective, all students should have immediate access to technology. Moreover, technology should be used creatively to extend the learning process, not merely to teach and offer practice in technical skills. According to Fraser, schools in a democratic society must insure that (1) all schools have adequate and appropriate technological resources and (2) teachers are competent to foster the kinds of computer-based learning that can work to level the academic playing field.         Fraser's second major case in point is teacher education. Similar to other areas of reform, teacher education has received a great deal of attention, attention that—according to progressives—has been, for the most part, misguided and even counterproductive. Fraser surveys the Carnegie and Holmes reports and finds them heavily focused on standards that are exclusionary and undemocratic.         Ironically, Fraser is critical of the fact that the choices for reform in teacher education have been presented as a dichotomy: The options ... seem too often to be limited to either the complete implementation of the Holmes and Carnegie proposals or to casting a critical eye on the reforms efforts in a way which—given the absence of alternative reform visions—actually supports the maintenance of a status quo which should be satisfactory to no one. (p. 162) And he calls on progressive educators to move beyond that dichotomy to articulate a new program, something they have not done to this point.         Fraser could be writing about himself. For much of the book, Fraser remains firmly grounded in the "language of critique," most often presenting ideological dualities constructed of diametrically opposing positions. Yet the dialectical progression is incomplete, lacking both the recognition of the fabric connecting opposites and the impetus toward resolution.         In discussing teacher preparation, Fraser does attempt to go beyond critique, working with, while at the same time questioning, proposals from the Holmes and Carnegie reports. The result is a call to action that is described in something approaching programmatic terms. Fraser's proposal focuses on four points drawn from the two reports and augmented with ideas based in his own democratic emphases: an arts and sciences major for pre-service teachers, concrete strategies for the recruitment and retention of people of color, substantive procedural changes to effect the empowerment of teachers, and the development of clinical experiences that are at once more professional and more supportive.         His work with teacher education is the model for what might have been addressed with respect to the other areas of reform that are discussed in the book. Without much concrete support from Fraser, the people for whom the book was written—the teachers, administrators, students, and citizens "who still believe that democracy means more than capitalism" (p. xv)—still carry the burden of deploying what Fraser calls "programmatic language;" of articulating new, more democratic, practices; and of pressing for the implementation of those practices. For this reviewer, all those with a stake in education must take action in these ways if public schools are to play a significant role in promoting social equity and justice.         Overall, the usefulness of this book in furthering the discourse on school reform is limited, for reasons that speak directly to the limitations imposed by Fraser's approach. For the target audience (i.e., "those who still believe that democracy means more than capitalism") the book provides an affirmation of beliefs and a summation of the arguments of the left. The criticisms of education and of society are clear and engaging for a target audience that already acknowledges the validity of most of the claims. Fraser preaches well to the choir. For those on the other side of the border, those who believe in capitalism and the merits of existing distributions of power and wealth, the book will be dismissed on ideological grounds within the first ten pages. There is no middle ground in a border war or a battle for a human being's soul, and Fraser's elucidation of the particular demarcations of the battle over school reform offers no exception. About the Reviewer Jerry D. Johnson is a doctoral student in the educational administration program at Ohio University. He is currently employed as principal of Boyd County High School in northeastern Kentucky, serves on the Board of Directors for the Kentucky Chapter of the National Association for Multicultural Education, and is a member of the advisory council for the Kentucky Safe Schools Association.