Originally written at a time of crisis in the education system of Britain - occasioned by cuts, contradictions and change - many of the issues discussed in this book are still relevant today. Debate in the book focuses upon an examination of the nature of the crisis, an exploration of the impact of the crisis upon school processes and upon the relationship between life in school and in the wider community, an investigation of the responses being made by pupils, teachers and educationalists to the day-to-day manifestations of the crisis and a consideration of how the current crisis is giving a particular poignancy to issues to do with the theories and methods employed in our study and interpretation of contemporary educational processes.

Acknowledgements. Introduction Len Barton and Stephen Walker. Part 1: Research in Crisis. 1. Qualification Inflation, Pupil Investment and a Changing Sixth Form Carol Buswell. 2. Teaching Till Two Thousand: Teachers' Consciousness in Times of Crisis Martin Cole. 3. Multicultural Education: Emancipation or Containment? Barry Troyna. 4. Someone Else's Children: The New Vocationalism in Further Education and Training Denis Gleeson. 5. The State and the Independent Sector: Policies, Ideologies and Theories Tony Edwards, Mary Fulbrook and Geoff Whitty. Part 2: Crisis in Research. 6. On the Application of Qualitative Research to the Policy Process: An Emergent Linkage Ray Rist. 7. Ethnography and Social Policy for Classroom Practice Andrew Pollard. 8. Classroom Control and Initial Teacher Training: The Contribution of Ethnography Martyn Denscombe. 9. The Paradigmatic Mentality: A Diagnosis Martyn Hammersley. 10. Phenomenon and Form in Interactionist and Neo-Marxist Qualitative Educational Research W Gordon West.11. Relative Autonomy Reconstructed David Reynolds. 12. Ideology, Agency and the Process of Schooling Henry A Giroux. Index.