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Changing the Subject of Education? A Critical Evaluation of ‘Vulnerability Creep’ and its Implications

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 March 2017

Kathryn Ecclestone
Kathryn Ecclestone*
Affiliation:
School of Education, University of Sheffield E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

Vulnerability has become a ubiquitous description in policy and everyday educational settings as well as a foundation for a progressive politics, inside and outside education. Increasingly embedded in apocalyptic discourses about mental health, a psycho-emotional interpretation of vulnerability has elevated its status as a powerful and highly normative cultural metaphor. The article uses a critical realist approach to explore wider developments in ‘therapeutic culture’ that frame the rise of what I call ‘vulnerability creep’ in the education system. Drawing together examples of vulnerability creep in English universities, I argue that the Prevent counter-terrorism strategy is a stark illumination of dangers that arise when educational goals and practices are rooted in images of psycho-emotionally vulnerable human subjects. The phenomena explored in the article raise important social science questions that require further empirical and theoretical study.

Keywords

Critical realismmental healthsubjectivity
Type
Themed Section on Vulnerability and Social Justice
Information
Social Policy and Society , Volume 16 , Issue 3 , July 2017 , pp. 443 - 456
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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