One morning early in 2021, we abruptly stopped a meeting in which we were conceptualizing this book because, as Americans, we were shocked by the news flash that right-wing insurrectionists had suddenly stormed the US Capitol. The truth is, by then we had become used to living with much of the unpredictability of our times, we were used to disruption and the onslaught of media messages, to living in an increased state of instability and fragility, and to the never-ending feeling of despair. Working on a book related to precarity in education was something we took up while simultaneously experiencing precariousness ourselves. Together, as white women, we processed how we were dealing with a global pandemic and the rise of political extremism (Rogers et al. 2017), our country’s racial reckoning (Jones & Hagopian 2020) overlapping with the #MeToo movement (Williams, Singh, & Mezey 2019), along with the irreversible environmental change related to global warming, all while institutions around us downsized and restructured to avoid or delay further demise.

Historically, the concept of precarity had its inception in the field of labor studies examining the implications of economic change stemming from neoliberal economic and social policies which emerged over the past three to four decades (Sassen 2013). Labor studies scholarship has mined how such economic shifts, globally and locally, have directly impacted work and people’s livelihoods, rendering both unstable, unpredictable, and temporary (Kasmir 2018; Means 2019; Standing 2016). Other studies prioritize a broader engagement of focus on neoliberalism as a force that creates experiences of precarity – both economically and also politically, socially, and culturally (Harvey 2003; Means 2018). Political science examines the relationship of democracy and precarity (Schapp et al. 2020; Goodson & Schostak 2021). Another realm of scholarship examines forms of violence such as war, torture, and kidnapping, with a focus on the affective experience of precarity (Butler 2008; Kasmir 2018). And yet another area of research focuses on precarity’s relationship to social movements (Casas-Cortés 2021; Kasmir 2018). In this sense, precarity can give rise to the emergence of a new politicized awareness, along with changes in one’s sense of self, using the term “precarity pride” to emphasize how precarity evokes conditions for action that are positive (Casas-Cortés 2021, p. 511). What is important in these instances is developing an understanding of precarity that is grounded in a deep knowledge of the underlying conditions.

Those on the social margins are impacted the most (Perry, Aronson, & Pescosolido 2021). When intersections of multiple types of disorientation, insecurity, vulnerability, and destabilization are present, the experience of precariousness is layered and amplified.

Butler’s ideas, in a general sense, parallel many others in the social sciences that argue for a much more dynamic understanding of the lives of others, of context, of histories, of the ways people are socialized to believe certain things and not others, etc. These help us to develop an understanding of our moral obligations to engage conditions of precarity that may be played out very differently than in our own lived experience. Perhaps this is nowhere more important than in education.

Research related to precarity in education covers a wide range of conditions, from neoliberal policies, entrenched poverty, populist politics, and the global pandemic, among others. The effects of neoliberal educational reforms in recent decades have played a decisive role in advancing the conditions of precariousness through limiting access to funding and other resources for some schools relative to others, and for promoting a market-based approach to education over concern for student experience and learning (Ewing 2018; Lipman 2011; Noddings 2006; Weiner 2011). The intensification of neoliberal education reforms in recent decades has also had consequential impacts on teachers, leaving them feeling de-professionalized and constrained in their curricular decision-making amid legislation mandating increased testing (Cody 2019). It has also spawned job instability and worsening conditions of work in education (Blair 2018).