Marxism, Pedagogy, and the General Intellect

This book is the first to articulate and challenge the consensus on the right and left that knowledge is the key to any problem, demonstrating how the left’s embrace of knowledge productivity keeps it trapped within capital’s circuits. As the knowledge economy has forced questions of education to the forefront, the book engages pedagogy as an underlying yet neglected motor of capitalism and its forms of oppression. Most importantly, it assembles new pedagogical resources for responding to the range of injustices that permeate our world. Building on yet critiquing the Marxist notion of the general intellect, Derek R. Ford theorizes stupidity as a necessary alternative pedagogical logic, an anti-value that is infinitely mute and unproductive.

“The difficult depth of Ford’s argument is his push for us to acknowledge the limits of reform. … Ford is not convinced that negotiation will produce the political imaginary necessary to overcome the crisis and violence of capital. Rather than being trapped within the logic of capital, he argues that as educators we should chart a path of exit that begins with refusing the terms on which knowledge making begins.” (Sara Carpenter, Adult Education Quarterly, Vol. 72 (4), 2022)

“Is stupidity nothing but a bad thing, holding human society back from its full potential? On the contrary, Ford says not only is stupidity an inseparable partner to learning, but it also holds the potential to be used for revolutionary resistance against the capitalist system which exploits the working class and knowledge itself.” (Jasmine B Timmester, Policy Futures in Education, Vol. 20 (7), 2022)

“A worthwhile contribution for educational researchers and theorists, and for students and scholars entangled in these discussions. It provides a much-needed critical approach to the Marxists and anti-Marxists regarding pedagogy, the knowledge economy, and the general intellect. Indeed, this is the first book to challenge the consensus on the right and left that the leftist understanding of knowledge as the key to many problems causes knowledge productivity to stay within capital’s circuits.” (Jianxin Guo, Jingxian Tang, Lei Zheng and Cong Wang, Education as Change, Vol. 26, 2022)

“Ford’s major critique in the book is that at the present moment Marxists are united with the ruling class in their belief in learning … . The pedagogical function of learning begins with ignorance and moves into learning in never-ending spiral thus creating a constant expansion of the general intellect that capital can profit from … . To counter this never-ending spiral, Ford puts forth the pedagogical form of stupidity.” (Collin Chambers, Capital & Class, February 27, 2022)

“Ford’s work in Marxism, Pedagogy, and the General Intellect: Beyond the Knowledge Economy (2021) superbly shakes up the fields of education that have seemingly permanently moved away systems-wide/structuralist theories. Ford problematizes the very ideal of learning as a politically universal social value, as well as the idea that by simply democratizing knowledge we somehow counter the exploitation of capital.” (Marco M Laghi, Postdigital Science and Education, November 25, 2021)



"Ford deftly intertwines disability justice with anti-capitalism in an intuitive way, his analysis of the history of the knowledge economy is concise and informative, and his diagnosis of the problem on both left and rightside feel very cogent." (Calla Winchell, Midwestern Marx, midwesternmarx.com, November 11, 2021)

"Radical stupidity and a rejuvenated General Intellect versus capitalism’s knowledge economy: In this landmine of a book, Derek R. Ford convinces us that we have everything to gain by choosing the former." (Glenn Rikowski, Visiting Fellow, College of Social Science, University of Lincoln, UK.)

"Ford’s book beautifully cuts into the pedagogical how of knowledge emerging and returning from noise, how learning, which both the capitalists and the leftist endorse, makes knowledge emerge from noise to be 'grasped,' made transparent, and actualized. More importantly, in this stupefying yet clear presentation, he shows how stupidity can work as an alternative pedagogy that gestures toward an exodus of returning to the noise as it remains and sustains to build a communist world." (Weili Zhao, Assistant Professor of Curriculum and Instruction, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, China.)

"Marxism, Pedagogy, and the General Intellect provides crucial suggestions for thedesign and conceptualization of a 'new' public. The creatively and innovatively surprising argument generatively builds on Marxist theory and practice, and will be indispensable for adequately approaching the contemporary situation and redressing the problems generated by the contemporary capitalistic knowledge economy." (Ryom Munsong, Associate Professor of Faculty of Foreign Languages, Korea University (in Tokyo) and Vice Chief, Research Team on Contemporary Korean Studies at the Center for Korean Studies.)

"One would have to be truly stupid to enjoy this book, as it has no value whatsoever! Normally, such a comment would be considered the greatest insult, but Ford has written a book with a surprisingly subversive thesis that demands an equally surprising endorsement. If the left is to challenge the knowledge economy, it must recognize the collective power of stupidity as a refusal to instrumentalize, measure, and thus commodify education in the name of capitalist value production. Drawing on a wide variety of sources ranging from Karl Marx to Édouard Glissant to Avital Ronell and others, Ford produces a unique genealogy of stupefying pedagogies that enables social movements to claim the opacity and incomprehensibility of stupidity as resistant to the ignorance and arrogance of educators on the right and the left." (Tyson E. Lewis, Professor of Art Education, University of North Texas, USA.)

"It’s a necessary book for our moment, as organizers increasingly recognize the importance of educational processes to revolutionary transformation. In this sense, Ford’s book is a crucial offering to these movements." (Bradley Porfilio, The Hampton Institute)

Derek R. Ford is Assistant Professor of Education Studies at DePauw University, USA. He’s published five monographs and six edited volumes. Among other projects, Ford is also the editor of LiberationSchool.org.