Social maladjustment as a result of exclusion from social life. Reflections from the point of view of the neo-thomistic philosophy of education

Abstract

This article constitutes an attempt to answer a question about the causal relationship between social maladjustment and exclusion. The analysis has been conducted in the light of the Neo-Thomistic philosophy of education with the use of works by mainly Polish representatives of the notion. The research is introduced with a reflection upon human beings and the specificity of community relations created by them.
Upon these foundations, the author has attempted to characterise social exclusion and maladjustment in the light of Neo-Thomistic thought. The author’s reflection reveals the key meaning of an individual’s recognition, appreciation and her striving for the common good for the sake of the process of his/her social inclusion. Consequently, the author has raised the issue of moral education as a process aimed at teaching an individual how to recognise and realise the common good. Understood as the development of moral
virtues, representatives of the Polish tradition of Neo-Thomistic philosophy think that moral education is connected with actions. The quality of an action depends, in turn, on the good, for which a community surrounding a developing individual will strive. The author’s research has led to the conclusion that, in
the light of Neo-Thomism, social exclusion is a primal phenomenon that leads to social maladjustment.