Book Review

Abstract

BOOK REVIEWS the authors could challenge the dominant paradigm and its efficiency or ineffi- ciency in providing solutions to the basic problems of education, problems most likely found through true understanding in the phenomenological sense of the word. One of the biggest challenges to researchers in CI my emphasis). The idea that parents and pupils are consumers of education does not fit into the type of research they suggest. Also, an expression such as “the rapidly changing demands of the 21st century” (66) causes the reader to ask: Whose demands? Those from the transnational corporations, those from the low-income farmers in Guinea-Bis- sau, or . . . ? It is also difficult to agree when they describe the World Bank as “the largest donor agency” (87). Many educators and others would see the World Bank as a bank and not as a donor agency. Instead of consensus, we need critical and world-systems perspectives. For in- stance, what if the position of a low-income country in the world system is the most important factor contributing to the country’s inability to run a quality and relevant education system? Finally, it is difficult to tell who the target readers are. As mentioned earlier, the book does cover a broad area and a variety of themes, but it is impossible to go deeply into the issues raised within only 142 pages of text. On the other hand, many of the issues, historical and otherwise, are not well known to students in CI yet the book takes for granted that the reader is familiar with the area. As a result, the book is too broad for experts and assumes too much for undergraduate students. In all, the book has an important message, but I feel that the authors attempt to do too much in too few pages. They could have omitted some issues and repetition and gone more deeply into a narrower selection of issues. HOLGER DAUN Stockholm University Education in a Globalized World: The Connectivity of Economic Power, Technology, and Knowledge by Nelly P. Stromquist. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002. 221 pp. $22.95 (paper). ISBN 0-7425-1098-0. $65.00 (cloth). ISBN 0-7425-1097- Nelly Stromquist’s ambitious volume, Education in a Globalized World: The Connectivity of Economic Power, Technology, and Knowledge, is a significant contribution to the literature on globalization and education. Adopting an international comparative approach, Stromquist draws on examples from developed and industrializing coun- tries and critically examines the influence of globalization on primary, secondary, and higher education. The author also brings a carefully crafted theoretical frame- February 2004