{{Short description|1993 book by Thomas Sowell}} {{Infobox book | name = Inside American Education: The Decline, The Deception, The Dogmas | image = Inside American Education.jpg | caption = | alt = | author = [[Thomas Sowell]] | title_orig = | working_titl e = | translator = | illustrator = | cover_artist = | country = United States | language = English | series = | release_number = | subject = | genre = [[Education]] | publisher = [[Free Press (publisher)|The Free Press]] | pub_date = 1993 | pages = 368 | awards = | isbn = 0029303303 | oclc = 855170876 | congress = LA210 .S65 1993 | dewey = 370.973 }} '''''Inside American Education: The Decline, The Deception, The Dogmas''''' is a book by economist and social theorist [[Thomas Sowell]] (hardcover 1993, paperback 2003, Kindle Edition 2010) that details Sowell's assessment of the state of [[education in the United States]] (both [[K-12 education]] and [[higher education in the United States|higher education]]).
The book received a wide range of reviews, with ''[[Forbes (magazine)|Forbes]]'' and ''[[National Review]]'' praising it, while academics such as [[John Brademas]] questioned aspects of the book concerning multiculturalism and higher education costs.
==Contents== Sowell was critical of a number of educational programs and paradigms that became popular in the United States in the 1960s onward such as ''[[Man: A Course of Study]]'', [[values clarification]], [[self-esteem]] and [[sex education]].<ref name=Silber />{{rp|81-82}}<ref name=Michaels />{{rp|50}}
Sowell was critical of schools of education for training the future teachers in educational fads and having low overall standards, and was critical of states requiring people to have credentials from schools of education to take teaching jobs.<ref>{{cite book|title = Inside American Education: The Decline, The Deception, The Dogmas (Hardcover)|year = 1992|publisher = Free Press|pages = 23-27, 288-291|isbn = 978-0029303306|url = https://archive.org/details/insideamericaned00sowe|url-access = registration}}</ref>
Sowell argued that higher educational institutions were full of double standards, including standards that excused violence and disruption when carried out in the name of politically correct goals, but were extremely harsh on small infractions that might be perceived to oppose politically correct goals.<ref name=Michaels />{{rp|50}}<ref name=Silber />{{rp|84-85}} Sowell also criticized the decision of [[Stanford University]] president [[Donald Kennedy]] to expel China scholar [[Steven W. Mosher]] from the Ph.D. program, alleging: "Not one stated requirement for the doctorate in anthropology was even claimed to have been violated...Instead, criteria of personal behavior were created ''ex post''.<ref>''Inside American Education'', p. 192</ref> Regarding higher education, Sowell criticizes the practice at large universities of designating undergraduate instruction to graduate assistants.<ref name=Silber />{{rp|84}}<ref name=Michaels />{{rp|51}} ==Reception== Sowell appeared on ''[[The Diane Rehm Show]]'' on January 13, 1993 to discuss the book.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.c-span.org/video/?37291-1/diane-rehm-radio-talk-show|title=Diane Rehm Radio Talk Show|date=January 18, 1993|publisher=C-SPAN|accessdate=August 25, 2018}}</ref>
[[Chester E. Finn Jr.]], a former United States Assistant Secretary of Education under [[William Bennett]], praised the book in a review for ''[[National Review]]'' as "a clear, hard-hitting, amply documented work that manages to be strong without being shrill, sensible yet not narrow-minded, outraged but not outrageous."<ref>{{citation|last=Finn|first=Chester E. Jr.|title=Revenge of the Blob|url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=9302050388&site=ehost-live&scope=site|work=National Review|date=February 15, 1993|volume=45|issue=3|pages=49–50|url-access=subscription|access-date=August 26, 2018}}</ref> For ''[[Forbes (magazine)|Forbes]]'', [[James Michaels|James W. Michaels]] called Sowell "an American [[Émile Zola|Emile Zola]], accusing the smug American educational leadership of hypocrisy, anti-intellectualism, avarice and propagandizing for essentially left-wing causes...in a factual, analytic style."<ref name=Michaels>{{citation|last=Michaels|first=James W.|title=Ph.D.s in hypocrisy|work=Forbes|pages=50–51|date=March 29, 1993|url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=93669047&site=ehost-live&scope=site|volume=151|issue=7|url-access=subscription|access-date=August 26, 2018}}</ref>{{rp|50}}
A review in ''[[Arts Education Policy Review]]'' called the book "a penetrating and comprehensive criticism of the educational establishment. Amidst the turbidity of educational debate, it provides a bracing splash of cold reason...The book is an excellent resource for policy discussions and development and offers provocative analysis of the many ills besetting education. Sowell adeptly dismantles many of the familiar arguments for multiculturalism, racial quotas, values clarification, various administrative policies, and other educational practices, and in so doing, he exposes the deceptions and dogmas that have insulated these practices from accountability."<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Barton|first=Laurie|date=April 1996|title=Book Review: The Emperor Has No Clothes|url=http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10632913.1996.9935071|journal=[[Arts Education Policy Review]]|language=en|publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]]|volume=97|issue=4|pages=39–40|doi=10.1080/10632913.1996.9935071|issn=1063-2913|url-access=subscription}}</ref>
[[John Brademas]], a former [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic Party]] member of the [[United States House of Representatives]] and president of [[New York University]], offered a critical review in ''[[The New York Times]]'': "Some of Mr. Sowell's attacks are on target, but his generalizations are so extravagant and his tone so self-righteous and bombastic that he undermines his case."<ref name=Brademas>{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/03/28/books/the-victory-of-the-leftwing-storm-troopers.html|title=The Victory of the Left-Wing Storm Troopers|last=Brademas|first=John|work=The New York Times Book Review|page=11|date=March 28, 1993|accessdate=June 12, 2025|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180826214744/https://www.nytimes.com/1993/03/28/books/the-victory-of-the-leftwing-storm-troopers.html|archive-date=August 26, 2018|url-status=live|url-access=limited}}</ref> Brademas added that the book "offers little constructive counsel" on dealing with the issues surrounding education in the United States.<ref name=Brademas />
[[John Silber]], then president of [[Boston University]], found the book to have "strengths" and "occasional weaknesses" and likened Sowell's perspective to that of a "military historian, not as a battlefield correspondent".<ref name=Silber>{{cite journal|last=Silber|first=John|title=Reviews: Inside American Education|url=https://research.ebsco.com/c/wm4vue/search/details/pzgzx6ssnv|work=Academic Questions|year=1993|volume=6|issue=3|pages=80-85|url-access=subscription|doi=10.1007/BF02683290}}</ref>{{rp|80}} Silber concluded that the book "identifies the obstacles keeping the American people from achieving an excellent system of education as political" while finding that it "too easily discounts our cultural difficulties".<ref name=Silber />{{rp|85}}
''[[Publishers Weekly]]'' called some critiques in this book regarding athletic scholarships and [[publish or perish]] "well reasoned" but added that Sowell "often goes wildly askew, as when he argues that sex education causes teen pregnancy."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-02-930330-6|title= Inside American Education: The Decline, the Deception, the Dogmas |work=Publishers Weekly|date=January 1993|accessdate=June 12, 2025|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161030143716/https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-02-930330-6|archive-date=October 30, 2016|url-status=live|url-access=limited}}</ref>
''[[The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education]]'' had a critical review by journalist David Hatchett, finding "a tendency to see complicated problems in narrow, simplistic terms" while praising the chapters about "economics irregularities in the country's network of elite universities".<ref name=Hatchett>{{cite journal|last=Hatchett|first=David|title=Sowell on Education|jstor=2962524|work=The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education|issue=1|year=1993|pages=103-105}}</ref>{{rp|103}} Regarding Sowell's critique of federal financial aid disincentivizing private universities from limiting costs, Hatchett counters that most college students attend public universities and lack access to financial aid.<ref name=Hatchett />{{rp|104}} Furthermore, Hatchett was most critical of the book's views on public K-12 education, for instance opposition to multiculturalism and sex education: "Schools are not just bureaucratic islands isolated from the mainstream of U.S. society. They...are products of the values and social currents of the society that produced them."<ref name=Hatchett />{{rp|105}}
==References== {{reflist}}
{{Thomas Sowell}}
[[Category:Books by Thomas Sowell]] [[Category:Books about education in the United States]] [[Category:1993 non-fiction books]]