This paper addresses the question "what is school?," and argues that the answer to this question has an essential political dimension. I focus on two very different attempts to characterize school--Ivan Illich's "Deschooling Society" and Jan Masschelein and Maarten Simons's "In Defence of the School"--and demonstrate that both texts miss the political potential which is inherent in school. The two texts are analyzed along two relational axes: relations between school and society, and relations between children and political subjects. Illich rejects children's de-politicization while accepting the assumption that school operates according to a similar logic as society in general. Masschelein and Simons, on the other hand, advocate a separation between school and society, but also accept the separation of children from politics. I aim to integrate Illich's analytical categories into Masschelein and Simons' discussion, in order to mark important directions for political struggles both over and within school.