Authors: Mariano Fernández Enguita, Luis Mena Martínez and Jaime Riviere Gómez
School failure in Spain is a well-known and much studied problem. This book seeks to advance our knowledge of this problem, focusing on the processes that lead to students dropping out of school and centring analysis on the situation, trajectory and discourses of young people who are considered to be school failures.
(2004). School and ethnicity: the case of gypsies. Pedagogy, Culture & Society: Vol. 12, No. 2, pp. 201-216. The schooling of Gypsy children has become a major challenge for the Spanish educational system. After centuries of, first, exclusion and then segregation in separate schools, an egalitarian policy and a sudden enforcement of compulsory schooling have resulted in difficulties and conflicts in numerous Spanish schools. The specificity of the Gypsy way of life, paradoxically, brings to light the arbitrariness of the school system, i.e. its dependence on a particular culture and way of life marked by nation-state, market economy, wage labour, sedentariness, nuclear family, rule of formal law, etc. After the initial stages of exclusion and segregation, educational policy towards Gypsies is now going through a reinterpretation of the idea of equality, departing from formal egalitarianism to arrive at some form of multiculturalism. Yet this reinterpretation is always on the basis of an external appraisal of the needs and opportunities of this ethnic minority by different professional groups. 
Power is a multi-dimensional phenomenon. Even restricting our considerations to the economic public sphere, i.e. markets and organizations, we should recognize at least three main sources of power: property, authority and qualification, that is, power on (or through, or on the basis of) means of production (the matter of the economic system), work (its energy) and knowledge (information); or let us say economic, social and cultural capital. No matter the justification (or not) of any critique of economic and social power (of property and authority, of capital and state), intellectuals’ and teachers’ radicalism, as far as it is not matched by a parallel or even harsher critique of cultural power (qualification, division of labor), should be considered more as a reflection of (not so much on) status incongruence than as a critical stand. This must be specially emphasized as we enter in an informational economy and a knowledge society in which the long waited Platonic utopia, an aris-tocracy of knowledge, could come into effect but also reveal itself as more anti-egalitarian than any past of stratification in the open society.
This article examines the way in which rising nationalisms in the process of constructing new nations or reconstructing past ones make use of the school institution, processes and agents. The case of Spain is examined, namely that of Catalan, Basque and Galician nationalisms, to show the evidence that new or secessionist nationalisms happen to be as manipulative as the old or unionist Spanish one. This appears clearly in the enforcement of differential languages as unique school languages, the manipulation of geography and history or the use and abuse of nationalist symbols. Finally, I try to explain how and why in this process there is a collusion of interest among nationalist forces and the teaching profession.
In: The Politics of Education. Challenging Multiculturalism, Edited by Christos Kassimeris, Marios Vryonides. To be published 2011 by Routledge 
Oliver Boyd-Barrett and Pam O'Malley have brought together a collection of the best recently published and specially commissioned articles which chart the rapid and extensive process of education reform in Spain over the last two decades. This report presents a current review of the policies rolled out by the various education authorities and an analysis of their general characteristics, as regards those deemed to be of greatest int... |
Inequality is a theme that has been endlessly explored in areas from the Bible to modern-day economic analysis. But are we any closer to understanding the nature of inequality? In this paper, Mariano F. Enguita (right), a visiting professor of sociology at the London School of Economics and Political Science from the University of Salamanca, in Spain, provides a multidisciplinary look at the concept of inequality and what it is about inequality that concerns humanity. 
In this paper Mariano F. Enguita, visiting professor of sociology at the London School of Economics and Political Science from the University of Salamanca, attempts to define a broader field for economy than the one suggested by traditional economics. Enguita argues that the economy cannot simply be reduced to "market" and "non-economic surroundings." It must be viewed more dynamically as a series of networks that interact to produce modes of production and circulation. 
This paper analyses how accountability relates to the traditional definition of the teaching profession in southern European countries. Historically when the teaching profession was defined, a break was marked with civil society and the State brought active support to establish a school system independent from churches, notables and communities in which only peers can assess the quality of a teacher. This definition is now challenged by the Anglo-Saxon notion of accountability and the networking of schools. It is argued that this evolution is characterised by three patterns: professionalism (peer recognition), the capacity to be accountable to society of how resources allotted to school are used and adaptability (capacity to innovate according to local needs). The combination of these patterns is essential to the integration of southern European countries into international, accountability-based regulation systems without breaking with their traditions.
Education et sociétés 2010/1 (n° 25) 
In C. McCarthy, ed., Transnational perspectives on popular culture and public policy, N.Y., Peter Lang, 2009
The panorama of the Spanish educational system has recently been completely transformed by the progressive incorporation of two previously absent groups: the Romani people and immi-grants. The dominant note in referring here to both groups is ethnicity. This is so because, on the one hand, the Roma—who in Spain also refer to themselves and are referred to as Gypsies—tend to strongly differentiate themselves ethnically from the rest of the population (Gadges), and are also strongly differentiated by the latter. On the other hand, while immigrants may come from anywhere in the world and any cultural background, in the case of Spain the majority have emi-grated either from the Maghreb (and are therefore mainly Arab or Berber, as well as Muslim), or from Central and Andean America (and are thus generally indigenous or mestizos). Beyond the expected difficulties and effects produced by the encounter between the school culture and the cultural identities and practices of each of these groups, other more specific challenges may arise from the articulation of ethnic group and class, or ethnic group and gender, in the specific envi-ronment of the school institution. It is to these unforeseen effects that this study is dedicated.
The fate of teaching and of the school must be considered against the background of the pace of social change. Or so argues Mariano F. Enguita, visiting professor in sociology at the London School of Economics and the Institute of Education from the University of Salamanca. In this paper, Enguita explores the role of the school in an epoch of major historical changes and addresses the relationship between educational and social reform.
SHORT VITA
Mariano Fernández Enguita studied Economics, graduated and obtained a Ph.D. in Political Sciences and later graduated in Law. Professor in Sociology (associate since 1983, full since 1994), he has been Head of the Dpt. of Sociology and Communication and Director of the Spanish-Japanese Cultural Centre at the U. of Salamanca, where he leaded the Centro de Análisis Sociales (Centre for Social Analisys, CASUS, casus.usal.es) and the Observatorio Social de Castilla y León (a regional social watch).
Now he teaches at the U. Complutense of Madrid, being also head of the School of Education Section of the Department of Sociology VI, where he leads the Barómetro del Profesorado (Teachers’ Barometer) and the Barómetro de Opinión Hispano-Luso (Spanish-Portuguese Opinion Poll).
He has researched and published widely on social inequalitity, organizations and education. He’s been visiting scholar at the universities of Stanford, U.C. Berkeley, Wisconsin (Madison), SUNY (Binghamton), LSE (London), IOE (London), Lumière-LyonII (Lyon) and Sophia (Tokyo), and has lectured in tens of Spanish and Latin American universities and institutions.
Among his more than twenty books and two hundred book chapters and journal articles, some recent publications are Educar en tiempos inciertos, published in Spain, Brazil and Portugal, and ¿Es pública la escuela pública?; and, in English language, School Failure and Dropouts in Spain, Barcelona, Fundación La Caixa, 2010; "Ethnic group, class and gender in education: Paradoxes in the schooling of Moroccan and Roma students", in C. McCarthy, ed., Transnational perspectives on popular culture and public policy, N.Y., Peter Lang, 2009; “Get to Know Yourself or Better Not: The Multidimensionality of Power and the Pseudoradicalismof Intellectuals and Teachers”, The International Journal Of Interdisciplinary Social Sciences vol. II, 2008; “Professionalism, accountability and innovation in teaching”, Education et Societés 25, 2010. |
