Using Habermas's Theory of Communicative Action to analyze the Changing Nature of School Education in Hong Kong (1945-2008)
Author: Si-wai Chan
Publisher: Red Publish
Published: 2012-10-31
Total Pages: 312
ISBN-13: 9888164759
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis book’s discussion is based on Habermas’s Theory of Communicative Action. Jürgen Habermas, is known for his work on the concept of modernity, particularly with respect to the discussions of rationalization originally set forth by Max Weber; arguing it has a limited view of human action. By using and to extend the concept of Habermas’s Theory, Chan handles this book by focusing how social reproduction was possible in school education, how school education was worked in general, and how school education was developed. In this book, Chan states that, “(i)n my personal experience as a secondary school teacher in Hong Kong, I observed that many of my students with little family support were not admitted into higher education. They entered into the job world after completing their secondary studies. I wondered whether, in my own professional work, I had helped, to some extent, to perform such social reproduction.” Moreover, he tries to seek for an answer, “I began to study Habermas’s theory of communicative action, and studied how it could be applied to study the relation between school education and society in Hong Kong, especially in explaining how social reproduction was achieved.” Furthermore, in this book, he attempts to understand the phenomenon of social reproduction through school education, and contributes to the current discussion on how school education could be developed in Hong Kong.