No Education Without Relation

Book excerpt: This book is a collective statement about a new approach to education - the pedagogy of relation. After revisiting a number of existing conversations, the authors bring together several theoretical traditions under the umbrella of the pedagogy of relation. This book is an appeal to develop a common frame of reference for educational approaches based on the primacy of relations in education. The authors try to understand human relations rather than educational processes, behaviors, methods, curriculum, etc. The authors also examine the dangers that a pedagogy of relations may present, and the implications such a pedagogy may have for curriculum and educational policy. The promise of the pedagogy of relation is to offer a viable alternative to dominating trends in educational thinking - trends that emphasize control over teacher and student behavior as the main way of achieving excellence.