Justice-Oriented Visions for Public Education in a Multiracial Democracy: Insights from Research on School Integration

Brown v. Board of Education has played a central role in imagining educational justice in the United States. However, the lessons that we should draw from school desegregation is contested terrain, and desegregation efforts have largely failed both to grapple with the country’s multiracial constituency and to offer a positive vision for schools. In this essay, we use theoretical conceptualizations of justice, relational theories of race, and research literature to offer a more robust vision of public schooling for a multiracial democracy. This multidimensional, situated, and relational framework is one powerful tool for those designing research, policies, and practices that help us move toward multiracial democracy.