When Arnold became a government school inspector in 1851 he joined the professional bureaucracy of a modernizing state. A classical education was widely thought to qualify men for this civil service employment by giving them the necessary detachment for their work, especially for factual analysis. And a detached, reflective attitude was welcomed by politicians since it kept the civil servants at a distance from politics. Arnold's brief was to produce ‘general reports’ and ‘general observations’, whereby he functioned at the general, detached level that he had valued in poetry. He could also develop his ideas in practice in varied educational assignments and writing. Here he moved from seeking wholeness in himself to seeking greater breadth and wholeness in pupils and teachers, and a national system of education.

As educational provision became more subject to parliamentary control, civil servants were widely supposed to keep distant from political controversy and maintain professional neutrality. But schools were enmeshed in power relations and Arnold's ideas developed during his educational work so that by the 1860s he was no stranger in the world of party politics. His work then brought him into the political arena in ways that ranged from attendance at parliamentary debates to lobbying politicians and writing political criticism. His first writing in periodical journals, in 1862, when he took on a propagandist role, was driven by the educational views that are elaborated in this chapter. His publicist activity in general arose from his belief in modern education through state intervention; his 1862 essay, ‘The Twice-Revised Code’, publicized his opposition to the plans of the Liberal Education Minister, Robert Lowe, for a system of ‘payment by results’ in elementary schools. This will be discussed in the next chapter since it bore importantly on his subsequent writing as a publicist.

His educational work was also important in the evolution of his views on order. For the ideas and methods that he urges in schools were a foundation for his ideas and writing about culture in Culture and Anarchy.