Conflict of Interests: The Politics of American Education, Fourth Edition

Conflict of Interests: The Politics of American Education provides a critical understanding of the political and social forces shaping educational politics in the United States. It describes and analyzes how policy is made for American schools, and its effect on all our lives and thinking. Spring argues that the politics of Education is driven by a complex interrelationship between politicians, private foundations and thinktanks, teachers’ unions, special-interest groups, educational politicians, school administrators, boards of education, courts, and the knowledge industry. This text uses many current examples to illustrate conflicts over educational policies. Spring links these conflicts to economics, culture, multiculturalism, language, religion, and equal opportunity. Spring discusses textbook publishing, standardized testing, the political uses of the judicial system, and the politics of education at each level of government.