The Ethics and Politics of New Brutalism in Education: Infrastructures, Affects, and Insurgent Possibilities

Abstract This paper explores the emergence of new brutalism in education as a political, infrastructural, and affective formation that normalizes hardness and domination. Drawing on Achille Mbembe’s (2024) notion of political brutalism and Michael Truscello's (2020) theorization of infrastructural brutalism, the paper examines how contemporary regimes of governance reconfigure education through violence—epistemic, material, and affective. Two examples—Trump 2.0’s renewed assault on higher education in the United States and Taliban 2.0’s repression of women’s and girls’ education in Afghanistan—illustrate how brutalism functions globally as a mode of affective and ideological control. The analysis advances a vision of anti-brutalist insurgency : an ethical and pedagogical orientation that transforms exposure into solidarity through micro-practices of care, repair, and endurance. The paper concludes by reflecting on what it means to educate ethically in brutal times, nurturing care without denying hardness and reimagining education as a site of collective repair.