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This review has been accessed times since May 5, 2006

Anyon, Jean (2005). Radical possibilities: Public policy, urban education and a new social movement. New York and London: Routledge.

Pp. 240
$22.95   ISBN 0-415-95099-6

Reviewed by Ramin Farahmandpur
Portland State University

May 5, 2006

For additional reviews of this book, see
Anderson (2005) & Appleton (2005).

In the last quarter of the century, Jean Anyon has become one of the most prominent figures in the field of sociology of education, and within academic circles, scholars have acknowledged her contributions toward the advancement of Marxist sociology of education. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, as the debates over social reproduction and its relationship to education and schooling intensified, Anyon’s scholarship attracted a large number of educators and policymakers. Both her essays, Social class and the hidden curriculum of work (1980), and Social class and school knowledge (1981) have had a profound impact on the way in which teachers and researchers think and conceptualize the relationship between schools and society. Anyon’s new book, Radical possibilities: Public policy, urban education and a new social movement, is the latest addition to an impressive list of contributions she has made to the field of sociology of education.

In the introductory chapter of her book, Anyon shares a personal story involving her father who, during one of the most shameful episodes in American history, was accused by Joseph McCarthy and his anticommunist crusaders of being a communist collaborator. Anyon’s brief discussion of her family’s long history of involvement in radical social and political activism, and her commitment to anti-oppressive pedagogy, offers readers important insights into her social and political convictions. Toward the end of the chapter, Anyon explains that she sees her new book as a form of “intervention” and struggle against social injustices.

Anyon begins her book by examining the impact of macroeconomic policies including minimum wage, tax policies, housing, job training and transportation on educational policies and reform initiatives. She argues that student underachievement, unequal funding of public schools and the high dropout rate among working class students and students of color are linked to macroeconomic policies that work toward maintaining and reproducing social inequities. She believes that the success of school reform efforts depends in part on reforming macroeconomic policies at the state and federal level.

Anyon links the causes of poverty to the absence of high-wage, high-skilled jobs in the United States. She attributes the lack of high-wage employment opportunities to the poverty experienced by 36 million Americans. Anyon writes that between 1973 and 1995, wages in the United States declined by 70%. After the economic boom of the 1960s, economic mobility not only came to a screeching halt, but it also sharply declined. Anyon correlates the low wages of workers to the growing poverty in America. She refutes the claims made by some economists and policymakers who argue that acquiring more education will boost wages, or help qualify workers for higher paying jobs. On the contrary, Anyon writes that in the next decade most jobs will not require a college degree. She discredits the claim that obtaining more education will stimulate economic growth and social mobility. In fact, the outlook for high paying jobs for the next ten years appears to be bleak. The reason is that the fastest growing sector of the U.S. economy is now the low-wage, low-skill retail and service industry.

Anyon also focuses on the effects of federal policies on minimum wage and union organizing. Anyon believes that federal policies and practices are responsible for the causes of poverty. She provides government statistics to demonstrate how macroeconomic policies have contributed to the ‘cycle of poverty.’ In contrast to the federal government’s position, Anyon believes that raising the minimum wage will not have a negative impact on job growth.

Another major area of concern for Anyon is the sharp decline in union membership over the last three decades. Thanks to the Reagan Administration’s fierce union-busting laws, union membership declined from 25% in 1978 to 14% in 2000. Anyon believes unions are important organizations because they protect the rights of workers. More importantly, union wages are on average 28.4 percent higher than non-unionized wages. As a result, Anyon recommends that workers should begin to concentrate their efforts on organizing and rebuilding unions.

Anyon suggests that the influence of education on income level is not as strong as some economists want us to believe. The reason is education only accounts for one-third of the income of workers. Hence, we cannot blame the lack of education of workers for their declining wages. Rather than blaming education for the downward trend in wages, Anyon draws our attention to other determining factors including race and gender. Export and outsourcing of jobs to developing countries, and the growing number of part-time employment in the domestic economy are also factors that depress wages. Anyon writes that the salary of one out of every six college graduates is less than the average high school graduate, which goes to show that more education does not translate into higher wages and salaries for workers. In short, her point is that economic factors have a greater impact on the educational opportunity and outcome of workers.

Anyon recommends that long-term sustainable school reforms should begin with reform efforts targeting federal social and economic policies. Examples include “passage of significantly higher minimum wage laws with health insurance and other benefits; elimination for the working poor of regressive tax policies that fall most heavily on them; and the enactment of policies that protect union organizing” (p. 39).

Anyon identifies a number of factors that have contributed to the growing social and economic inequality in the United States. These include: corporate welfare; the regressive social security tax; payroll tax (37% of the federal budget); and the advantages of home ownership, which significantly reduce income taxes of homeowners. In sum, Anyon argues that the concentration and the unequal distribution of wealth in the United States are trends that we cannot simply ignore.

Anyon believes poverty “limits” educational opportunity. It is unrealistic, she argues, to expect all children to achieve academic success when 16 percent, or 12 million, children in the United States live below the poverty line. Perhaps, even more disturbing, is that nearly half, or 44%, of these children are living in extreme poverty (an income of $7,400 for a family of three in 2001). Anyon maintains, “economic strength is the engine of systematic school reform”(p. 71). In other words, Anyon is proposing the restructuring of the economic foundations of society.

Anyon suggests that the successful implementation of education reforms and initiatives require “regional job, transportation, housing and municipal tax reforms”(p. 76). She explains that low-income minorities are no longer concentrated in urban communities. There are now growing suburban communities segregated by race and class. A growing trend is the growing number of urban schools in suburban communities. Yet, whereas the concentration of poverty in urban areas is 66%, in rural areas it stands at 26%.

Anyon also identifies a “spatial mismatch” between entry-level jobs and prospective employers. While a large number of potential employees are in urban centers, most jobs are located in the suburban areas. Many people searching for jobs do not have access to transportation to these job sites. Anyon writes:

There are a number of policies the implementation of which would connect urban job seekers with employment in regional economies: training programs that make explicit connections between workers in urban centers and suburban employers; transportation reforms that provide public bus or train routes between the city and outlying job centers; the placement of businesses already successful in the regional market within central city neighborhoods; mobility programs to move families who want to relocate to higher income, less segregated areas; and affordable hosing in more affluent areas so entry-level workers could reside closer to job centers. (p. 84)

Anyon emphasizes the link between school and housing segregation. She maintains that ending school segregation requires housing policy reforms that include such provisions as providing affordable housing to working class families in middle class communities. Of course, as we all know, busing students of color from urban communities to middle class communities in the 1960s was not successful and met a number of setbacks and challenges. According to Anyon, housing integration is a key component to the success of macroeconomic reform initiatives. She writes:

Confining low-income people of color to housing in poor urban neighborhoods and low-income minority suburbs also produces segregated, low-income schools—neighborhood elementary schools as well as high schools—since most city Black and Latino high school students attend large, comprehensive high schools where enrollments re almost all low-income students of color. The following characteristics of low-income urban schools are extremely well documented: insufficient school funding; few if any advanced courses; too few qualified teachers; undemanding pedagogy; buildings in disrepair and unprepared for technology; too few classroom computers and computer-prepared teachers; large classes; and all-too-often, unchallenging academic content. (p. 95)

In Savage Inequalities, Jonathan Kozol (1991) wrote that school funding through local property taxes is one of the main reasons for the unequal distribution of resources in public schools. To remedy the disparities in public school funding, Anyon proposes “regional revenue sharing.” By having “state controlled taxes paid into a common pool” that would guarantee all children from working-class, middle class, and affluent communities an equal share of property taxes to fund their local schools is one way to accomplish this task. In short, Anyon believes that this reform policy with help reduce existing disparities in how schools are funded.

Anyon writes that school reform can be successful only to the extent that economic opportunity for those who live in urban communities is significantly improved. She questions whether philanthropic foundations can play a key role in genuine school reform efforts. Most philanthropic foundations, Anyon argues, are reluctant to fund or support progressive and radical projects aimed at reforming macroeconomic policies. Anyon views existing school reform efforts linked to regional campaigns, grassroots organizations and movements such as Jobs with Justice and Campaign for Sustainable Milwaukee more promising. Anyon also highlights the rich history of social movements and the Civil Rights movement. She underscores the importance of Civil Rights struggles that preceded the civil rights movement. She also identifies the existence of a “dialectical [relationship] between social activism and the promulgation of social justice policy.”

Anyon proposes a number of strategies that would facilitate school reform. One such strategy involves building social movements like ACORN (The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) and IAF (Industrial Areas Foundation). These social movements, Anyon suggests, can serve as examples and blueprints in creating and building social movements. A second source is through Education Organizing, which involves organizing community members into a social and political force. Examples include the Mississippi-based Southern Echo and Community Collaborative for District 9 in Bronx, N.Y. With 16 million members, Anyon believes that we can tap into the progressive wing of the labor unions. Examples include the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees (HERE). Anyon identifies the fourth movement as the national campaign for a living wage. The fifth movement involves youth organizations such as the Boston Area Youth Organizing Project (BYOP); the Los Angeles based Schools No Jails group and the Student Labor Action Project (SLAP) group. Finally, Anyon believes that students are themselves a powerful and visible force for engaging and participating in social activism. Thus, she invites students and teacher to engage in civic activism.

Anyon believes that a radical social vision enables us to make the link between economic exclusion and educational inequality; a link that most mainstream sociological theories of education fail to make. Furthermore, the difference between Anyon’s approach and mainstream approaches to educational reform is that she recognizes the dialectical unity between schools and macroeconomic structures. In other words, Anyon sees school reforms and macroeconomic reforms as mutually inclusive.

Anyon’s scholarship has enriched the field of sociology of education and has deepened our understanding of the relationship between schools and society. Her scholarship has also made it possible for a new generation of scholars to follow in her footsteps to make further advancements in the field of sociology of education that would bring some critical relief to the social injustices and inequities in schools. Informed by the rich history of grassroots social movements and civil rights struggles, the book provides students, parents, community activists and policymakers concrete strategies and practical applications that could be implemented in schools and in communities to facilitate educational reform and social change. In a time marked by uncertainty, pessimism and hopelessness, Radical Possibilities offers teachers and teacher educators hope, optimism, and a radical social vision of a new democratic society.

References

Anyon, J. (1980). Social class and the hidden curriculum of work, Journal of Education, 162(1), 67-92.

Anyon, J. (1981). Social class and school knowledge, Curriculum Inquiry, 11 (1), 3-42.

Kozol, J. (1991). Savage inequalities: Children in America’s Schools. New York: Crown Books.

About the Reviewer

Ramin Farahmandpur is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Educational Policy, Foundations and Administrative Studies at Portland State University. His interests include critical pedagogy and multicultural education. He is the co-author of Teaching against Global Capitalism and the New Imperialism: A Critical Pedagogy. Boulder, CO: Rowman and Littlefield, (2005).

Copyright is retained by the first or sole author, who grants right of first publication to the Education Review.

Editors: Gene V Glass, Kate Corby, Gustavo Fischman

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