Will, Education, Political Theory

As Dewey shows, a theory of Education is systematically related to a political doctrine. For example, his pedagogical Experimentalism promotes political Progressivism, just as pedagogical Dogmatism promotes political Conservativism. In turn, a theory of Education presupposes a model of Experience. For example, Experimentalism recognizes, as has been previously discussed, that Will is the immediate object of Consciousness, i. e. that the introduction of uncertainty and novelty is intrinsic to Experience. In contrast, Dogmatism, which consists in the inter-generational transmission of established, and perhaps eternal, 'truths', presupposes that Consciousness is fundamentally a not necessarily embodied processor of information. Furthermore, the locus of cultivation for Experimentalism is the public dimension of personal activity, whereas, dogmatism privileges privacy. Hence, the contemporary Progressive-Conservative political polarity expresses an opposition of models of Experience, the sharpness of which calls into question the soundness of any 'centrist' compromise.