Reimagining the Educational Field: Thoughts on a Critical Criminology of Education

• Main Author: Karl Guebert
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2015-05-01
• Series: Societies
• Subjects: critical criminology of education; imaginative criminology; governance; theory
• Online Access: http://www.mdpi.com/2075-4698/5/2/442

Prompted by the need to expand the criminological enterprise, this paper makes a case for a critical criminology of education, one that takes a governance approach. It seeks to illustrate what such a criminology might entail by developing an analytic framework with which to analyze the educational field. The framework is put to use to provide an analytic discussion of Ontario education policy reformations concerning student discipline. Education was conceptualized by policymakers as an institution for disciplining and governing students, specifically through the concept of “bullying”. From this analysis, the paper suggests it is possible to theorize education as a “security apparatus”, one that is increasingly concerned with the governance of social (in)security and public safety. The discussion suggests that education is an important institution for governing by identifying one regulatory project that concerns student behavior both within and beyond the school. In so doing, the paper illustrates the creative process in developing a criminology of education, and the value of imaginative thinking within criminology.