Objectivism and the Social Construction of Knowledge

Abstract

The subject of this paper is what has come to be known as the new sociology of education, in particular the views expressed by G. M. Esland in his contribution to Knowledge and Control.1 The intention is to free the new sociology of education from the philosophical assumptions on which its proponents have based it, because those assumptions are both unsound and unnecessary. An alternative set of premises will then be proposed, reliance on which will remove theoretical incoherence while still allowing the prosecution of the empirical inquiries envisaged by the sociologists. The principal aim of the new sociologists of education was to question the assumptions of educators which had been accepted uncritically by previous sociologists of education. Thus, Young argued that 'existing categories that for parents, teachers, children and many researchers distinguish home from school, learning from play, academic from nonacademic, and able or bright from dull or stupid, must be conceived of as socially constructed'.2 It is clear that what was new about the new sociology of education was that, in holding educational categories to be socially constructed, its practitioners were engaging in the sociology of knowledge. In doing so they assumed that the sociology of knowledge presupposes a certain epistemological stance, namely, relativism or subjectivism. And it is this assumption that has incurred so much obloquy from philosophers. The essence of relativism is succinctly stated by Bloor: 'The objectivity of knowledge resides in its being the set of accepted beliefs of a social group.... The authority of truth is the authority of society.'3 Trigg speaks for many philosophers when he puts the opposing view: 'A fundamental distinction must be drawn between the way the world is and what we say about it, even if we all happen to agree. We could all be wrong.'4 The relativist believes that what makes it true that p is the fact that a socially dominant group asserts that p, whereas the objectivist argues that what makes it true that p is simply p, or, more explicitly, that a