ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the expulsion of pupils from schools as a pedagogical tactic that defines the boundary between education and the state. Teachers such as Karpova and Seleznev, who expelled students from their schools, were in effect disclaiming responsibility for the education of these particular children and turning them over to the organs of the state. In this case, however, state authorities, initially in the form of police and then the Communist Party officials who investigated the incident, in effect repudiated this decision by educators. These state authorities demanded that the schools, and particularly teachers, reclaim responsibility for educating these students, regardless of their transgressions. By asking what course was taken by an authoritarian system when teachers responded to disobedience by expelling children from schools, the chapter argues that maintaining order through expulsion illustrated a key, and contested, relationship between education and the state.
