Chapter 92: The Work of Nancy Fraser and a Socially Just Education System:

The work of Nancy Fraser has been critical for those working in research fields concerned with social justice and education (see for example, Cribb & Gewirtz, 2003; Keddie, 2008; Lipman, 2008; Power & Frandji, 2010). This chapter outlines key concepts within her theories of justice, traces some of the challenges posed to her work and through the use of a case study on male teachers shows how some of her work can be used to promote an understanding of social justice problematics in the field of education.

Nancy Fraser’s theorizing of social justice has occurred in both the Cold War and post-Cold War era. This chapter focuses on her work in the latter period. However, her (1989) collected essays Unruly Practices provide an indication of the tensions and debates that surround her later work. This set of essays originated from her engagements with New Left and socialist feminist theorizing. Throughout this body of work is a consideration of the implications of her theorizing for activism. The various chapters in this book all come from articles published prior to the end of the Cold War and at a time when identity politics and poststructural theorizing were impacting upon justice debates within the academy in significant ways. In this book she begins her later task of: “developing a critical theory of recognition, one that identifies and defends only those versions of the cultural politics of difference that can be combined with the social politics of equality” (Fraser, 1997a, p. 12).