I found this series of interviews by Alain de Botton directly relevant to our recent discussions regarding our law school experience and the challenges faced during our 1L year and in choosing a career. In particular, I think the second video, with its discussion of the historical superiority of religious institutions over universities in offering genuinely valuable life advice, is particularly interesting in the way it relates education to the idea Eben discussed in class of law being a weak social force. Perhaps it is precisely because religious and cultural institutions provide more valuable life guidance than formal educational programs that they exert such a relatively strong influence over normative social discourse compared to, say, ethicists or political scientists. If that is the case, then De Botton's proposals can be seen as attempts to implant respect for formal education (and the law) in younger generations to the point that their formative influence eventually exceeds countervailing religious and cultural forces. If that is his goal, I believe achieving it requires a far broader review of the politicization of the schooling process beyond the moral/spiritual guidance he emphasizes. Current debates regarding charter schools, high-stakes testing and educational inequality tend to gloss over the surface of what appear to me to be more fundamental and pressing issues - lack of democratic student participation, inequity of access, and the poorly defined role of the state in child welfare. Unless those more fundamental institutional questions are addressed, how can we expect our education system to promote democratically active, tolerant citizens of a global community?

-- RohanGrey - 29 Mar 2012

Rohan, this is a really interesting series. As both Wright and de Botton touch on in the first video, most atheist literature out there is a lot less favorable to religion as an institution than de Botton seems to be. I agree that his look at practical education/self-improvement in religion vs. conventional schooling is particularly noteworthy and (at least to me) quite novel. And I think your conclusion about the influence of religion on social discourse being a result of its position as a life adviser is spot on. However, I think you go a little bit too far in suggesting that de Botton is ultimately trying to bolster respect for formal education in such a way that it supplants religion. Maybe as an atheist he wants this, but as a theorist of policy he seems more tolerant of religion as an institution (and says as such) and more focused on what we can learn from religion. His path for giving more credibility and significance to education is more of a top-down approach, whereas yours seems more bottom-up. I agree with you that the questions you asked regarding the inequities of education and its failure to achieve a democratic populace are certainly worth asking and devoting a lot of energy toward, but to me de Botton's message is simpler; he seems less focused on how to make society better and more focused on how to make school better. Of course they go hand-in-hand, but if you asked him how to make society better, even through formal education, I'm not so sure he wouldn't agree with you that the bottom-up approach must be the start of it.