The Goose-Step (book)

The Goose-step: A Study of American Education

First edition
Author	Upton Sinclair
Country	United States
Language	English
Subject	Sociology
Publisher	Self (Pasadena, California)
Publication date	1923
Media type	Print (Hardcover first edition, softcover second edition) Reprinted 2004 by Kessinger Publishing in paperback
Preceded by	The Brass Check
Followed by	The Goslings

The Goose-step: A Study of American Education is a book, published in 1923, by the American novelist and muckraking journalist Upton Sinclair. It is an investigation into the consequences of capitalist control of American colleges and universities. Sinclair writes, “Our educational system is not a public service, but an instrument of special privilege; its purpose is not to further the welfare of mankind, but merely to keep America capitalist." (p. 18)

The book is one of the “Dead Hand” series: six books Sinclair wrote on American institutions. The series also includes The Profits of Religion, The Brass Check (journalism), The Goslings (elementary and high school education), Mammonart (great literature, art and music) and Money Writes! (literature). The term “Dead Hand” criticizes Adam Smith’s concept that allowing an "invisible hand" of capitalist greed to shape economic relations provides the best result for society as a whole.

Published in 1923, The Goose-step was written during the post–World War I Red Scare. It was a time of great political awareness and activism on both left and right in the United States. On the left, there was widespread interest in Socialism and Communism, especially in the results of the 1917 Russian Revolution. Populist ideas were still alive, and Anarchism was in the news, with the Italian anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti arraigned in 1920 for a robbery and murder. On the right, the anti-German jingoism and florid patriotism of the war years had stirred up passions against pacifism and ‘foreign’ ideas such as Socialism and Communism. The Palmer raids against suspected radicals occurred in 1919, and superpatriotic organizations like the business-sponsored, anti-union Better America Foundation worked to shape public opinion.