Abstract

This dissertation focuses on the the central conflict in educational authority that is being felt strongly in the United States today. It is a conflict between approaches to pedagogical authority aimed at preserving the cultural traditions and shared ways of thinking of the past and those that call for the cultivation of a critical attitude which questions the basis of every claim to authority. The former insist that a worthy education should be based on imparting to students the great values and ideas of the past. The latter assert that education should be aimed at fostering critical thinkers and active citizens who can question and transform the values and ideas that we have inherited. ;In order to see whether it is possible to resolve the conflict in educational authority, I compare Hannah Arendt's and John Dewey's views on authority. These two thinkers were chosen not only because each has made a significant contribution to the problem of authority in a democratic society, but also because Arendt's "traditionalist" approach to education provides a good contrast to Dewey's "progressive" views. In addition, a comparison of these two conceptions of authority can be fruitful since Arendt and Dewey are grounded in different philosophical traditions. Thus, the comparison of their respective views on authority provides an opportunity to examine, from different philosophical perspectives, an issue which they both thought crucial to both politics and education. ;The critical comparison of Arendt's and Dewey's views on authority leads me to conclude that it is both possible and desirable to integrate their views of authority in education. This new integrative view of authority, which I call "the authority of social and political responsibility," is important because it can be used to resolve the central conflict in educational authority, as well as to strengthen the existing conceptions of democratic education. Moreover, "the authority of social and political responsibility" has valuable implications for some of the most burning issues in contemporary American education