バートランド・ラッセル「教育の目的」
* 原著：Education and the Social Order, 1932, chapt. 2: The negative theory of education
* 出典：牧野力(編)『ラッセル思想辞典』
以下は牧野力氏による要旨訳（ただし、少し字句を修正）に英文（原文）を添付したものです。
今日、教育の目的について、三つの説があり、それぞれ擁護者がいる。
第一の説： 成長の機会を提供し、有害な影響を除くこと
第二の説： 教育によって個性を最大限に伸ばすこと
第三の説： 教育の目的は、個人と地城社会との関連において考えるべきであり、有用な市民を育てること
第一は最も新しい、第三は最も古い。第二と第三は、教育は何か積極的なものを与えることができるという点で共通の見方をしている。実際、教育は三者のどの一つだけを指導原理としても不十分であり、実際の教育組織は、三者すべてを種々の割合で混合している。
正当な選択は、三者間の程よい均衡にあると思う。第一は感情に関し比較的多くの真理を含み、教育におけるかなり進歩的な思想を支配しているが、知的で技術的な訓練に関しては消極的である。
( Three divergent theories of education all have their advocates in the present day.
Of these the first considers that the sole purpose of education is to provide opportunities of growth and to remove hampering influences.
The second holds that the purpose of education is to give culture to the individual and to develop his capacities to the utmost.
The third holds that education is to be considered rather in relation to the community than in relation to the individual, and that its business is to train useful citizens.
Of these theories the first is the newest while the third is the oldest. The second and third theories, which we considered in the preceding chapter, have in common the view that education can give something positive, while the first regards its function as purely negative.
No actual education proceeds wholly and completely on any one of the three theories. All three in varying proportions are found in every system that actually exists. It is, I think, fairly clear that no one of the three is adequate by itself, and that the choice of a right system of education depends in great measure upon the adoption of a due proportion between the three theories.
For my part, while I think that there is more truth in the first theory, which we may call the negative view of education, I do not think that it contains by any means the whole truth. The negative view has dominated much progressive thinking on education It is part of the general creed of liberty which has inspired liberal thought since the time of Rousseau. Oddly enough, political liberalism has been connected with the behef in compulsory education, while the belief in freedom in education exists in great measure among Socialists, and even Communists. Nevertheless, this belief is ideologically connected with liberalism, and has the same degree of truth and falsehood that belongs to the conception of liberty in other spheres.
The negative theory of education, therefore, while it has many important elements of truth, and is largely valid so far as the emotions are concerned, cannot be accepted in its entirety as regards intellectual and technical training. )
