"The state shall make no law with respect to the establishment of education."


For such a small book it is very densely packed with ideas so all I think I can do is outline some of them and highlight some of the questions that they raise for me. 'Deschooling Society' is not just about schools. Illich uses school as just one example of the way in which the whole of life has become institutionalised, and how "non-material needs are transformed into demands for commodities". (p9) As acquiring an education becomes merely a process of consumption it creates a whole new layer of poverty. People come to see themselves as impoverished if they lack the required amount of attendance at school that is considered appropriate. Poor countries then also take on this notion of school as a commodity that their children should have, and as such artificially create yet another area of deprivation. Nationally school divides people into those who succeed within the system and those who fail. Internationally it creates a caste system amongst countries based on how many years of schooling they provide for their children.


What happens when the state provides a school is that it actually "discourages and disables the poor from taking control of their own learning" (p.15). The more resources a government pours into schooling, the less are available to facilitate other informal, non-school methods of learning. And the easily recognisable failure of schools to adequately 'educate' all young people is seen not as a reason to seek alternatives but as proof that education is a costly and complex business that can only be carried out by certified professionals. Despite ever rising education budgets the outcomes for children from 'disadvantaged' backgrounds does not improve. Illich quotes figures from nearly 40 years ago, but the message is the same, pouring money into the schooling system will not fix it. The aim of 'equal' schooling for all children is economically unfeasible and absurd. Disadvantages that are inherent in the social and political structures cannot be changed by schooling. In many ways Illich sees school as actually reinforcing disadvantage. The role of the school system itself is also reinforced by the rest of society though the insistence on qualifications and certification to do so many jobs, things that people can acquire only through participation in and with the approval of the school system. He argues that there should be an end to employment discrimination based on attendance to the school curriculum, that getting a job should be based on competence tests rather than school certification.


I am not sure how, or even if, Illich would have labeled himself politically but much of the first part of the book seems to imply that school is a part of the mechanism that perpetuates inequality in society. He refers frequently to 'disadvantaged' groups and how school does nothing to improve their chances in life. Deschooling would be really just part of a much larger process of restructuring society.


The purpose of 'deschooling' would be to create a situation where all of life would be an educational experience. He argues that people gain knowledge in school only in so far as they are obliged to be there for such extended periods of time. The alternative is that responsibility for learning has to be passed back to the learner. Illich envisaged a system of 'educational credits' that an individual could spend throughout their life to acquire new knowledge or skills. He distinguished between learning skills and 'liberal education'. Skill acquisition relies on simulation of the situation in which they would be used, and 'education' is the exploratory and creative use of skills. At the end of the first chapter he admits that we cannot rely on the informal incidental education that occurred in pre-industrial societies, where children learned by real participation in their society. We need now in modern society to consciously create educational opportunities. But what is needed first is to break away from the delusion that the school system creates, that some education is necessary and some is not. School has divided the world into 'educational' and 'non-educational' and this is a totally artificial divide. He likens what school has done to education to what organised religion has done to the Biblical message. "It is enlightenment itself that is now being snuffed out in the schools." (p.31) From a Marxist point of view he talks about young people being 'pre-alienated' by their schooling; with knowledge as a mere commodity to be consumed. University should be an environment where there is dissent and real questioning of society and it's values, but instead it has become just the final stage of a very drawn out initiation into the consumer society open only to people who have excelled in the earlier stages of the school system.


School has three functions (not surprisingly education is not one of them): "the repository of society's myth, the institutionalisation of the myth's contradictions, and the locus of the ritual that reproduces and veils the disparities betwwen myth and reality." (p.43) Illich outlines the myths that need to be 'de-mythologised'. Firstly the need for unending consumption, the consumption of 'schooling' being the most firmly entrenched myth. Any self-taught activity is discredited by insistance on qualifications, which creates the 'demand' for schooling. Once schooling is accepted people doubt their own ability to learn things without instruction. Secondly is the notion that everything of value is measurable. Once people have been allocated a 'place' by the system pretty soon they become accustomed to putting themselves into a 'slot'. Over the years the school system has become more and more obsessed with measurement, the testing regime dominates the National Curriculum, starting with Baseline assessment, through three stages of SATs and on to the formal examinations at 16 and 18. Illich contrasts this with the idea that "personal growth is not a measurable entity." (p.45) Thirdly pupils must consume a pre-packaged curriculum. Schooling is supposed to be the place where your critical judgement is formed, but how can learning about yourself be part of a pre-packaged process. Over the years the costs of the curriculum have spiraled; they are now 'scientifically' designed, the more costly and complex the better, giving the illusion that what school provides is something special and that can only be delivered by professional teachers. Illich also points out that interestingly 'learning difficulties' have apparently increased over the years in line with expenditure on curricula, suggesting the explanation that pupils become resistant to the teaching as it becomes progressively more prescriptive.


Illich defines two categories of institutions; manipulative and convivial. School is top of his list of manipulative institutions because not only does the government compel use of it but it also frustrates alternative methods of learning. He also uses the example of the road system as something that has altered over time from its original purpose. It originated from a need for people to be able to travel from place to place and has been perverted into a need to own cars and the more cars people own the less effective the road system has become. School shapes our understanding of the world in subtle ways. To challenge the idea of institutionalised learning would cause people to lose faith in schools and have wider ramifications for the other manipulative institutions of our society, including the police, prisons, the army and mental institutions, all of which exercise control over aspects of society. Convivial institutions are things like public transport, parks, pavements, libraries, the postal service etc. which are run by government but do exercise any control over people using them. School reform becomes unimaginable for society because of the nature of the dependency and the demand that it creates for other manipulative instituations. It is a crucial part of the perpetuation of consumption as the principal purpose of society. It is then linked to the idea of production and consumption being the root of 'progress'. Illich links in to the nature of capitalist production of goods, defining them as more 'manipulative' depending on how artificial the demand for the product is. The school system is at the root of this demand because of the way it defines success and failure, by the way it offers to pupils the 'promise' of a future of affluence if they do what is asked of them by the system. People are led to believe that by having an 'education' they will be guaranteed access to the desirable consumer goods and a 'better life'. As a result of this people come to aspire to everything that is offered, and the juggernaut that is modern consumerism is fueled by these aspirations. To quote the EMA (Education Maintenance Allowance) leaflet from the DFES as one tiny example; "skills and qualifications mean you're likely to earn more money when you get a job". This message is dangled as a carrot for young people throughout their school career, and the obvious alternative threat of failure and poverty.


"Even the seemingly radical critics of the school system are not willing to abandon the idea that they have obligations to the young, especially to the poor, an obligation to process them ... into a society which needs disciplined specialisation as much from its producers as its consumers and also their full commitment to the ideology which puts economic growth first." (p.71) Illich argues that research into education that starts from the premise that education is an institutional process will not change anything because all it seeks to do is make the existing framework more efficient, not to change they way they think about education. Lifelong learning does not mean creating new opportunities for real learning but merely a process of "pushing out the walls of the classroom" so that the entire society becomes school. The next chapter outlines his ideas for creating an alternative learning web that would put learners back in control of their learning. His book predates the internet but Illich already recognises the importance of technology and computers, and the role they would play in facilitating connections and communications between people. He sees change happening and comments at one point that schools would be powerless to stop a mass rejection of the system. But I am left wondering what comment he would make on current education policies. Illich's ideas are still around, but I fear like so many things they are tamed to make them more acceptable. 'Individual Learning Plans' sound like something real, a chance for young people to exercise control over their learning, but what they are in effect is merely an illusion of freedom, where choice is still only within the parameters of pre-packaged curriculum and within the confines of the system. A true alternative approach needs to value "the unpredictable outcome of self-chosen personal encounter above the certified quality of professional instruction." (p. 74) It might sound, phrased like that, a somewhat romantic notion, but you just have to look hard at the system we have now to see that an alternative has to be argued for.

In his final essay Illich gives us a lesson in Greek Myth and makes an appeal for change that focusses on moving away from dependence on institutions. In conclusion he finds that the root of everything that is damaging in society, nationally and internationally, is based on the spiral of demand/production/consumption that is never satiated: "The ethos of non-satiety is thus at the root of physical deprivation, social polarisation and psychological passivity." (p.114) But he retains throughout his thinking a basically positive view of human nature and sees that a more hopeful future is there if people are open to it.



All quotes from 'Deschooling Society' by Ivan Illich ISBN 0 14 02.1280 9 (Pelican Books 1976)