David Baker (8) (1952–)

In contrast to some other reviews of this book on Goodreads, I don't think this is uncritical, nor unpersuasive. It draws on and ties together several decades of education research spread over numerous subfields into a central thesis (taking a neoinstitutional approach) which proposes that education (mainly through the university) is a primary institution rather than a secondary one. As such, it is responsible for many of the social and economic transformations that are usually labelled under various headings (new economies, different aspects of globalisation, even the individualism which is often bemoaned as a pernicious effect of "neoliberalism").
This notion of education as a primary institution allows Baker to draw out problems with and contradictions inherent to other theories of education as a secondary institution, which asserts education's essential function is re-productive, rather than primarily productive as Baker argues.
The weakest part of the book is probably the chapter on education and religion, as it relies on the American context, and generalises to the rest of the world from that (when it comes to the sociology of religion, a good rule of thumb is never to generalise from the USA to the rest of the world). Another issue with the book itself (rather than its content) is the index, which is dreadful. Still, best book on education I have read in years.… (more)