Titling a book on social studies The Social Studies Wars might cause the sneaking impression that this is just to provoke and to sell the product. This impression, though, would not at all do justice to the author. Ronald W. Evans' book indeed does focus on the history of American social studies as a 'story of turf wars among competing camps struggling [...] to either retain control of social studies or influence its direction.'
The Social Studies WarsTitling a book on social studies The Social Studies Wars might cause the sneaking impression that this is just to provoke and to sell the product. This impression, though, would not at all do justice to the author. Ronald W. Evans’ book indeed does focus on the history of American social studies as a ‘story of turf wars among competing camps struggling [...] to either retain control of social studies or influence its direction.’ The camps include ‘traditional historians, who support history as the core of social studies; mandarins, advocates of social studies as a social science; social efficiency educators, who hope to create a smoothly controlled and more efficient society; social meliorists, Deweyan experimentalists, who want to develop students’ reflective thinking and contribute to social improvement; and social reconstructionists, who cast social studies in schools in a leading role in the transformation of American society.’ Thesis
Evans’ thesis is ‘that what began as a struggle among interest groups gradually evolved into a war against progressive social studies that has strongly influenced the current and future direction of the curriculum.’ The author wants to verify his thesis by describing and interpreting chronologically the multiple social studies approaches and developments from the late 19th century to the present. Establishing Traditional History
This first chapter deals with the early dominance of history in the – what was later to be called – social studies curriculum. ‘History instruction, like civil government, was aimed at developing the good, patriotic, and obedient citizen [...] Traditional history won the day, becoming the dominant core [...] The curriculum studied in schools was deeply influenced by the work of commissions and committees on behalf of traditional history [...] It served to glorify the nation’s past [...] asking few questions about the structure of society or the direction in which it was headed’ (p. 19). The 1916 Compromise
The focus of the second chapter lies on the 1916 Report of the Social Studies Committee of the NEA Commission on the Reorganization of Secondary Education, which became the ‘dominant curricular pattern for most of the 20th century’ (p. 43). Although history was still the dominant subject, Evans sees the report as a ‘compromise, a moderate and progressive approach to social education aimed at creating cooperative citizens. It was part of the moderate [...] attempt to reform society aimed at curbing the excesses of industrialism’ (p. 44). Evans identifies clearly drawn ‘battle lines [...] between advocates of traditional history and competing models of social studies’. With the founding of new professional organizations like the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS), which was founded in 1921 and has not lost in importance since, the ‘battles over social studies took on an ideological tone of war between traditionalists and frontier thinkers’ (p. 45). Social Studies in Hard Times
Social studies during the 1930s, of course, have to be understood in the context of the Great Depression. The ‘larger battles’ were fought between the ‘progressives’ (mainly Dewey, Kilpatrick, Rugg, Counts of Teachers College at Columbia University) and ‘anti-progressives’. The decade ended with ‘a general shift to the left and toward increasing innovation in curriculum planning, toward approaches centered on social problems, and toward curriculum integration’ (p. 69). War and the War on Social Studies
Evans describes two major controversies dominating the social studies discourses during World War II, which both ‘were directly linked to wartime concerns over patriotism’ (p. 95): in the first place the controversy over Harold Rugg’s problem-centered social studies textbooks (ending up in several book burnings!) and secondly the controversy over the teaching of American history. Behind both controversies Evans sees ‘charges of subversion, a perception that a cabal of radical pedagogues at Teachers College and elsewhere was attempting to foist its views on innocent American schoolchildren’ (p. 93). The Cold War and the Return to Academic Study
During the postwar period the ‘rising cultural aversion toward controversial topics,’ linked with anticommunist fears, caused ‘a shift away from a social problems approach and toward a reemphasis of academic disciplines.’ Reinforced by the Sputnik shock ‘the disciplines had a full advantage’ (p. 119). Progressive education lost its influence in the 1950s – but did not die. The Era of the New Social Studies
Although there was a short-lived ‘burst of issues-oriented materials and concerns, reflecting 1960s issues in society,’ the long-term trends were ‘discipline based and, by the mid-1970s, toward a back-to-basics-approach. The war in Vietnam ended. Optimism was replaced by cynicism, with Watergate, the perceived American failure overseas, and the specter of nuclear holocaust. All denied the possibility of social improvement’ (p. 139). The Runaway Train of Standard Reform
According to Evans, the national reform movements from the mid-1970s and beyond ‘promoting the revival of history and geography and the return to the disciplines, [...] back to basics, the pursuit of excellence [...] were driven by educational, political, and economic forces outside of education. This was largely a response to a manufactured crisis, [...] driven by those in power and in control of considerable financial resources [...]. New Right and neo-conservative reformers were well organized, highly motivated, visible, articulate, and well funded’ (pp. 171-172). The standards movement has obviously fitted in with ‘this conservative restoration’ quite well. It ‘may freeze out the possibility of alternative approaches to social studies aimed at creating a thoughtful citizenry, in favor of a more narrowly conceived history and social science curriculum. The entire standards endeavor is predicated on the misguided notion of schooling as a lever for improving the position of the United States in international economic competition’ (p. 173). Supplement
All in all, Ronald W. Evans has collected more than sufficient material to verify his thesis ‘that what began as a struggle among interest groups gradually evolved into a war against progressive social studies that has strongly influenced the current and future direction of the curriculum’ (p. 176). His book covers the entire history of social studies education in the modern era of the United States. It analyses the underlying cultural (economic, social, political) contexts and it addresses the ‘home made’ failures of the progressive social studies camp critically. In this way Evans’ volume offers a rich supplement to R.F. Butts’ The Civic Mission in Educational Reform (1989) and to D.W. Saxe’s Social Studies in Schools. A History of the Early Years (1991). The Children’s Perspective
What Evans’ book does not provide, though, are insights into classroom practice, which would be necessary to learn about the real impacts of the struggles at discourse level. What still lacks is a social studies history on What and How Children Really Learn in Social Studies Classes in addition to Evans’ volume subtitled What Should We Teach the Children? and as a supplement to non-historical classroom-oriented studies like Becoming Political (C. Hahn, 1998) and Civic Education. What Makes Students Learn (R.G. Niemi & J. Junn, 1998). Bias
Of course, Ronald W. Evans has not produced a ‘neutral’ history of social studies (whatever that might be). Evans wrote his book, as Anna S. Ochoa-Becker is being quoted on the back cover, ‘through the eyes of an issues-centered educator’ – which will not surprise those that have been aware of Evans as the first editor of the prominent Handbook on Teaching Social Issues (NCSS Bulletin No. 93/1996), and those that have noticed that the book has been published by Teachers College, Columbia University, the very academic ‘home base’ of progressive educators. Gain
Would European civic educators gain anything from reading Evans’ book on United States social studies? They would for sure, because they would have the possibility to learn that subcultural (like educational and social studies) developments in the United States are just as diverse, complex and controversial as over here, and that the challenges (progressive) civic education in the United States faces seem to be quite similar to those in most of the European countries.
F. Klaus Koopmann, University of Bremen, Germany
Ronald W. Evans, The Social Studies Wars. What Should We Teach the Children? (New York and London: Teachers College Press, 2004)