Jonathan asked:

Would you tell me a philosophical approach to the issue of discipline in an educational environment?
Do current ideas promoting the use of corporal punishment and/or religion in schools hold weight
against the philosophies of the master minds in the past?

============

How about John Locke's Some Thoughts concerning Education(London, 1693),
§§47—52:

§47. The usual lazy and short Way by Chastisement and the Rod, which is the only Instrument
of Government that Tutors generally know, or ever think of, is the most unfit of any to be us'd in
Education, because it tends to both those Mischiefs; which, as we have shewn, are the Scylla and
Charybdis, which on the one hand or the other ruin all that miscarry.

§48. 1. This Kind of Punishment contributes not at all to the Mastery of our natural Propensity to
indulge corporal and present Pleasure, and to avoid Pain at any rate, but rather encourages it, and
thereby strengthens that in us, which is the Root from whence spring all vicious Actions, and the
Irregularities of Life. For what other Motive but of sensual Pleasure and Pain, does a Child act by,
who drudges at his Book against his Inclination, or abstains from eating unwholesome Fruit, that he
takes Pleasure in, only out of Fear of Whipping? He in this only prefers the greater corporal Pleasure,
or avoids the greater corporal Pain. And what is it, to govern his Actions, and direct his Conduct by
such Motives as these? What is it, I say, but to cherish that Principle in him, which it is our Business
to root out and destroy? And therefore I cannot think any Correction useful to a Child, where the
shame of suffering for having done amiss, does not work more upon him than the Pain.

§49. 2. This Sort of Correction naturally breeds an Aversion to that which 'tis the Tutor's
Business to create a Liking to. How obvious is it to observe, that Children come to hate Things which
were at first acceptable to them, when they find themselves whipp'd and chid and teas'd about them?
And it is not to be wondered at in them, when grown Men would not be able to be reconcil'd to any
Thing by such Ways. Who is there that would not be disgusted with any innocent Recreation, in itself
indifferent to him, if he should with Blows or ill Language be haled to it, when he had no Mind? Or be
constantly so treated, for some Circumstances in his Application to it? This is natural to be so.
Offensive Circumstances ordinarily infect innocent Things which they are join'd with; and the very
Sight of a Cup wherein any one uses to take nauseous Physick, turns his Stomach, so that nothing
will relish well out of it, tho' the Cup be never so clean and well-shap'd, and of the richest Materials.

§50. 3. Such a sort of slavish Discipline makes a slavish Temper. The Child submits, and
dissembles Obedience, whilst the Fear of the Rod hangs over him; but when that is remov'd, and by
being out of Sight, he can promise himself Impunity, he gives the greater Scope to his natural
Inclination; which by this Way is not at all alter'd, but, on the contrary, heighten'd and increas'd in him;
and after such restraint, breaks out usually with the more Violence; or,

§51. 4. If Severity carry'd to the highest Pitch does prevail, and works a Cure upon the present
unruly Distemper, it often brings in the room of it a worse and more dangerous Disease, by breaking
the Mind; and then in the Place of a disorderly young Fellow, you have a low spirited moap'd
Creature, who, however with his unnatural Sobriety he may please silly People, who commend tame
unactive Children, because they make no Noise, nor give them any Trouble; yet at last, will probably
prove as uncomfortable a Thing to his Friends, as he will be all his Life an useless Thing to himself
and others.

§52. Beating them, and all other Sorts of slavish and corporal Punishments, are not the
Discipline fit to be used in the Education of those we would have wise, good and ingenuous Men; and
therefore very rarely to be apply'd, and that only in great Occasions, and Cases of Extremity.

Locke's arguments — that corporal punishment encourages simple-minded hedonism, that it gives
malign associations to education and that it either provokes worse misbehaviour or produces a
servile, broken spirit — all have their echoes in contemporary debate. Incidentally, in the UK, 'current
ideas' do not promote corporal punishment at all — it has been forbidden in the state sector for twenty
years, and more recently has been made illegal in all schools.

Andrew Aberdein
Dept of Logic and Metaphysics
St Andrews University, Scotland