Discusses the lack of consensus among social studies educators as to definition of and rationale for the field. The relationships between social studies rationales and goals and between goals and objectives are examined. (RM)

Traces approaches of social studies from 1916 to the present. Contends that the "Citizenship Transmission" position which supports the status quo has been dominant in spite of the reform rationales which stress the process of thinking reflectively or the intellectual aspects of history and the social sciences. (KC)