Excluding the included: A reconsideration of inclusive education

Abstract

This article examines how the development of inclusive education policies has been constrained by the adhesion of traditional regular and special education imperatives. The fragmentation of educational policy-making presses us towards exclusion; and the protection of professional interests reinforces individual pathologies and creates further exclusionary pressures. The authors contend that inclusive education is not a linear progression from 'special educational needs' and we must endeavour to understand the very different nature of these knowledge bases. Deconstruction is presented as a way of exposing exclusion as it is inscribed within inclusive education policies. The article ends with a series of openings for dialogue about inclusion which address the relationship between ideas and politics; a new politics of research; envisioning forms of schooling which eschew the modernist blueprint; reflexivity; and the teaching of inclusion.