Beyond School. The challenge of co-producing and commoning a different episteme for education

ABSTRACT

This paper develops previous work in which we deployed a form of Foucauldian critique to clear a space in which it might be possible to think education differently. Here, in that space, we are hoping to ‘get lost’ in some unexplored spaces of possibility. We sketch some starting points, some ‘lines of flight’ for such thinking. To do this, we identify a concatenation of three crises and discuss briefly their inter-relationship. But the paper focuses primarily on education. The first of these crises, COVID, offers a moment, a space, in which we might think of ourselves, others, and the world differently. The second, climate, brings to bear a pressing urgency for change in the way that we think of our relation to the world in practical, political and epistemological ways. The third, education in relation to crises, is an opening within which some thinking might be undertaken about what it means to be educated, and in which the relation between education, community and sustainability, in a variety of senses, might be pursued. In the final sections, using concepts from Foucault, Olssen, Lewis and others, we seek to find inspiration from and an accommodation between Foucault’s self-formation and commoning – a practice of collaborating and sharing to meet every day needs and achieve the well-being of individuals, communities, and environments – as a new way to think education beyond modern episteme.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID
• climate crisis
• education
• school
• foucault
• self-formation
• commoning

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Many commentators argue that at the heart of the critical ecological analysis is the modern enlightenment belief in progress, and its concomitant – growth. Increase is the main strategy for everything. More always means better, new always means better, growth always means better. But the earth has limits, and it is impossible to move beyond them. Of course, schooling is itself a main partner of the growth paradigm.

2. https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/education/our-insights/how-covid-19-caused-a-global-learning-crisis

https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/education/our-insights/covid-19-and-education-the-lingering-effects-of-unfinished-learning

3. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48,223/pf0000373233

4. https://www.transformingsociety.co.uk/2021/11/01/have-you-seen-the-elephant-in-the-room-at-cop26/

5. https://www.transformingsociety.co.uk/2020/03/09/why-current-climate-change-policies-are-necessary-but-insufficient/

6. As one example in the UK ‘a generation ago, 70% of us walked to school. Now it’s less than half. That’s despite most people living within two miles of their closest primary school. As a result, one in four cars on the road during the morning peak are families on the school run, contributing to half a million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions annually – that’s more than the carbon footprint of some small countries’ https://energysavingtrust.org.uk/why-walking-to-school-is-the-path-to-net-zero/.

7. https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/education/overview#1

8. We are attempting here to both advocate and practice such critique.

9. https://economicsociology.org/2020/11/18/foucault-neoliberalism-redefined-homo-economicus/