On The Rational And Critical Inclination In Holmes's Theory Of Comparative Education

In the history of comparative education, Holmes's theory of comparative education is distinctive in originality and"theory-character"for its strong rational critical inclination. The critical inclination is permeated in Holmes's theory, which was summarized into two points namely redirection of aim and change of methodology. The rational critical inclination in Holmes's theory of comparative education stems from Holmes's awareness towards the crisis of society, education and comparative education. After World War Two, the international economy, society and education showed period of prosperous development which was regarded as"Golden Time", so as comparative education. But in the 60s of 20th century, economy, education and other aspects of society began to show some pessimistic sign of crisis. Comparative education is faced with crisis in academic system and practical value. In order to tackle the crisis in education and comparative study of education, and to counter the extreme malpractice of traditional comparative education, Holmes adopted the rational critical inclination of Critical Rationalism and construct his theory about comparative education in the basis of Critical Rationalism and Pragmatism. Comparative education of China is faced with crisis of both academic and societal aspects. The critical inclination of Holmes is enlightening for us to deal with the crisis of our comparative education.This thesis was mainly consisted of five parts:The first part was entitled"Arguments in Philosophy: Critical Rationalism vs. Positivism". The main content of the philosophical argument was introduced in this part. And then, the philosophical basis of Holmes's theory and his reflective-thinking of the foremen theories were analyzed.The second part was entitled"Redirection of Purpose: from Policy-Verification to Policy-Refutation". The purpose of comparative education in Borrowing-Period and Analyzing-Period is policy borrowing and verifying. But in Holmes's opinion, comparative study of education should pay attention to policy refutation. In this part, the criticism to the purposes of traditional comparative education by Holmes was generalized, and then the rational critical inclination showed in Holmes's ideas about purposes was analyzed.The third part was entitled"Change of Methodology: from Verifying-Logic to Refuting-Logic". Holmes opposed summarizing-verifying logic adopted in traditional comparative education research. Influenced by hypothesis-deduction logic of Popper, there was obviously a refuting-inclination in Holmes's theory of comparative education. In this part, the criticism to the methodology of traditional comparative education by Holmes was generalized, and then the rational critical inclination showed in Holmes's methodology was analyzed.The forth part was entitled"Thinking When There Were No Ways: The Criticality and The Crisis of Comparative Education". In this part, the author analyzed the formation of the rational critical inclination in Holmes's theory. The comparative education in our country is in crisis now. In light of Holmes's critical inclination, the author tried to probe into the formation of crisis in our comparative education in the perspective of criticality.The fifth part wan entitled"New Ways Exploring: The Current Significances of Strengthening Criticality in Comparative Education". Holmes tried to tackle crisis of comparative education by strengthening rational critical inclination, which was of great meaning though it went too far to some extent. Inspired by Holmes's ideas, the author tried to probe into ways to get rid of crisis in our comparative education in the perspective of criticality.