EXPERT ADVICE: The Mystification of Common Sense

ABSTRACT

The dialectical relation of ideology and common sense is explored here through an examination of the school‐family couple as an ideological state apparatus. It is argued that the production and promotion of expertise is crucial to the maintenance of social and cultural control. A case in point is taken to be the power of psychologists, with their emphasis upon the structuring of individual behaviour in the service of the State. The moralism of the experts is couched in terms of professionalism and expertise, particularly in the case of child‐rearing and socialisation. This produces a bureaucratisation and further control of activities (such as leisure and sexuality) once considered beyond the purview of the formal organisations of the State.