Governance thresholds and the causes of education policy reform: a global analysis 1789–2024

One consequence of the hype around globalization and education and debates on global political actors such as the World Bank, IMF and WTO—is that there has not been sufficient attention paid by education theorists to the development of a rigorous set of analytic categories that might enable us to make sense of the profound changes which now characterize education in the new millennium. 1 This is not a problema confined to education. Writing in the New Left Review, Fredric Jameson observes that debates on globalization have tended to be shaped by “…ideological appropriations— discussions not of the process itself, but of its effects, good or bad: judgements, in other words, totalizing in nature; while functional descriptions tend to isolate particular elements without relating them to each other.” In this paper we start from the position that little or nothing can be explained in terms of the causal powers of globalization; rather we shall be suggesting that globalization is the outcome of processes that involve real actors—economic and political—with real interests. Following Martin Shaw, we also take the view that globalization does not undermine the state but includes the transformation of state forms; “…it is both predicated on and produces such transformations.”3 Examining how these processes of transformation work, however, requires systematic investigation into the organization and strategies of particular actors whose horizons or effects might be described as global.

What Does Globalization Mean for Educational Change? A Comparative Approach

The chapter focuses on the discourses of globalisation in comparative educational policy and the politics of education. It examines competing ideologies, forces of globalisation and political, economic and cultural transformations impacting on education reforms, both locally and globally. The chapter analyses and evaluates the shifts in methodological approaches to globalisation and education reforms and their impact on education policy and pedagogy.

This article seeks to explain a paradox concerning education qualities and reform in Hong Kong and Macau: Hong Kong is ranked higher than Macau on Program for International Student Assessment and various world university leagues. Even so, the education reform in Hong Kong is more profound and vigorous than that in Macau. From the postcolonial perspective, this article argues that the education reforms in the two cities are affected by colonial legacies: Macau has long adopted a noninterventionist policy toward its education sector. The government lacks the political prowess and institutional means to proactively reform the school system and education curriculum. Conversely, the Hong Kong government has traditionally maintained a tight grip on various aspects of education to deal with various challenges posed by the cold war and the struggle between the Communist Party and the Nationalist Party of China. In addition, the different economic structures and economic development strategies lead to the different expectations of education quality: Macau's casino-based economy faces far less external competition than the financial and business service industries in Hong Kong do. Therefore, Hong Kong faces an urgent need to improve its education quality and sharpen its edge to stay competitive in the globalized economy with which Hong Kong is more closely connected.

The discourse on teachers as agents of school change has recently emerged in educational policies in many countries, emphasizing teacher-led educational reforms. The meaning of this rhetoric is quite vague; its practical meaning is revealed by analyzing how teachers’ roles are normalized in educational policies. With a Foucauldian approach, this study aims to critically analyze teacher images produced and distributed by South Korea’s educational reform policies over the last 20 years. This study addresses two research questions: (1) Under the rhetoric of teachers as agents of school change, what teacher images have been created by Korean educational reform policies over the last 20 years? (2) What are the non-discursive conditions that have led to the establishment of the teacher images presented in educational reform policies? To this end, 94 policy documents from the 5 Korean governments were collected and analyzed. The study results verified a contradictory character of policy discourse in that policies stating teachers as agents of school change appear to empower teachers to reform education, which is not true in reality. The results also revealed complex mechanisms enabling certain policy discourses to be formed by analyzing the formation process of particular teacher images produced by educational policies in relation to non-discursive conditions. Furthermore, this study showed that particular teacher images circulated by educational policies can regulate teachers’ everyday practices, contributing to understanding the way educational policies exert their power. Finally, the implications of the findings were presented.

This book examines what equity means in a nation where the schools are becoming more diverse. The authors consider how well our educational reform policies, often framed in the language of equity and opportunity, measure up to the challenges of achieving equity in a diverse nation. While there is growing awareness of the increasing racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic diversity of the nation, there is little recognition of how these trends affect the schools, particularly in formerly homogeneous communities. At the same time, inequalities in student achievement between different racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic groups persist, even as educational policy has intensified the focus on the achievement gap. These two challenges make definitions of equity and opportunity as urban problems obsolete and call for a critical examination of educational policy and reform from an equity perspective. Central themes include the critical examination of how equity is conceived under the law and in policy, the experiences of minority students in suburban schools, and the impact of current reform policies and strategies for achieving greater educational opportunities for all students.This book is designed for graduate and undergraduate courses in educational policy and policy analysis, for policymakers interested in a critical examination of current reform policies and options, and educational leaders and administrators struggling with the implementation of reform mandates. From a policy perspective, it includes a survey of the evolution of educational policies and reforms since the 1960s and traces the mix of legal and legislative legacies that have informed educational policy and equity. It describes how trends in suburban diversification affect the schools, something that has largely escaped the attention of educational reformers. It provides school-based and non-school-based remedies for achieving equity in diversifying suburban communities and articulates alternatives to the current accountability for performance approach. It offers new and innovative analyses of current approaches to school reform, including an analysis of how accountability tests can create the illusion of reducing the achievement gap and an examination of the paradoxes of federally funded compensatory policies that incorporate market-based strategies. Novel approaches—such as social emotional learning and placed-based college access strategies—are examined through an equity lens.

The Politics and Economics of Comparison

The American public schools discourse of the 21st century remains unabashedly obsessed with education reform. A mainstream narrative of “achievement gaps” and urban schools requiring swift rescue from power-hungry teacher unions and their self-serving memberships has dominated conversations about how to improve education for America’s schoolchildren (or, as emphasized in the policy arena, America’s future workforce). Outside of those who come from a long line of educators, coaches, and mentors, a growing share of the American public has seemingly embraced the notion that failing schools are created by union leaders who put teachers before students, teachers who protect the status quo, and/or parents who simply don’t care enough to engage in the education of their children. Consequently, various education reform efforts grounded in politicalphilosophies, cultural ideologies, and private agendas have trumped evidencebased approaches to effective teaching, learning, and leadership (Apple, 2001; Berliner and Biddle, 1995; Buras, 2008; Darling-Hammond, 2007; Ravitch, 2010; Vasquez Heilig et al., 2012). For instance, the corporate reform agenda, which supports a free market system of education, has focused on high-stakes testing and evaluation of students and teachers, expanding school choice options for parents through charter schools and vouchers, and overhauling collective bargaining agreements for teachers in order to close achievement gaps and improve student achievement (Hess, 2004; Hess and West, 2005; Ravitch, 2010). While this particular reform movement has spurred great appeal for and benefitted from feature-length films such as Waiting for Superman and Won’t Back Down, teacher recruitment programs such as Teach for America and corporate reform organizations such as Students First are fixated on firing bad teachers, closing underachieving schools, and recruiting parents to fire teachers and closeschools. These practices not only ignore the well-established education research literature on the structural factors that reproduce inequality and suffering; they are implemented in the name of equity and achievement. This well-funded rhetorical crusade to “close the achievement gap” by supporters of Teach for America like the Walton, Gates, and Broad Foundations (Ravitch, 2010) further extends and deepens such structural problems through its ahistorical approach to educational improvement that privileges the advantaged while purportedly advocating for the students who are most “at risk” (Howard, 2003). The same can be said for “grassroots movements” aiming to put “students first” that are supported by big city mayors and school choice proponents across the country. The purpose of this chapter is to present a historical analysis of the politicalrhetoric of equity and achievement in the high-stakes accountability reform movement and its implications for future education research, policy, and practice. As we consider efforts to advance educational equity and achievement within a contemporary policy context dominated by calls for innovation, charters, vouchers, alternative routes to licensure, pay-for-performance, and the end of collective bargaining, this chapter is guided by two central questions: First, how did American public education get here – a place where educational equity and achievement are more commonly associated with high-stakes testing and turnaround school models than by strategies to increase educational opportunity, access, and equity? Second, why does US education policy seem more focused on dismantling public schools rather than transforming them? Finally, based on how we got here and the history of competing policy paradigms and political rhetoric used to frame issues of educational equity, achievement, and reform, in what directions must education research, policy, and practice go in order to improve America’s diversifying schools? To answer these questions, this chapter begins with a discussion of the NationalCommission on Excellence in Education’s (NCEE) 1983 report A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform, which sparked the education reformmovement in America (Guthrie and Springer, 2004; Hunt and Staton, 1996; Wong and Nicotera, 2004). Given its unprecedented role in shaping US education policy, largely through its rhetorical influence as a political document, I will show how A Nation at Risk (NAR) serves as a useful model for understanding the political rhetoric of equity and achievement today. I will also argue that the co-optation of the language of equality, access, equity, and opportunity – hallmarks of education policy during the Great Society and Civil Rights Eras – poses an equal if not greater risk to both our nation and its students given its lack of attention to social and cultural contexts, culturally relevant leadership, and the role of community in education reform. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the promise and possibilities of community-based education reform as an approach to providing equitable educational opportunities and improving student and school performance in historically underserved and under-resourced neighborhoods.

The chapter offers a synthesis of current research findings on globalisation and education reforms, with reference to major paradigms and ideology. The chapter analyses the shifts in methodological approaches to globalisation, education reforms, paradigms, and their impact on education policy and pedagogy. The chapter critiques globalisation, policy and education reforms and suggests the emergence of new economic and political dimensions of cultural imperialism. Such hegemonic shifts in ideology and policy are likely to have significant economic and cultural implications for national education systems, reforms and policy implementations. The chapter also evaluates discourses of globalisation, cultural imperialism, global citizenship, human rights education, and neo-liberal ideology. It is suggested there is a need to continue to analyse critically the new challenges confronting the global village in the provision of authentic democracy, equality, social justice, and cross-cultural values that genuinely promote a transformative pedagogy. There is also a need to focus on the crucial issues at the centre of current and on-going education reforms, namely global citizenship, human rights education, social justice and access to quality education for all, if genuine culture of learning, and transformation, characterised by wisdom, compassion, and intercultural understanding, is to become a reality, rather than policy rhetoric.

The chapter offers a synthesis of current research findings on globalisation and education reforms, with reference to major paradigms and ideology. The chapter analyses the shifts in methodological approaches to globalisation, education reforms, paradigms, and their impact on education policy and pedagogy. The chapter critiques globalisation, policy and education reforms and suggests the emergence of new economic and political dimensions of cultural imperialism. Such hegemonic shifts in ideology and policy are likely to have significant economic and cultural implications for national education systems, reforms and policy implementations. The chapter also evaluates discourses of globalisation, and the ubiquitous trend towards the international large-scale assessment, and global educational standards. It is suggested there is a need to continue to explore critically the new challenges confronting the global village in the provision of authentic democracy, equality, social justice, against the background of education reforms.

The study conducted a critical appraisal of the education system and reforms in Kenya as influenced by the regime of the day. There are various factors that influence educational development in any particular country, namely political, historical, geographical, technological, religious, and ideological factors. The political factor is seen as the steering wheel of education in Kenya during pre-colonial, colonial and post-colonial periods. There is no doubt that educational policies on system reforms are significantly dependent on political and social conditions, which are no longer consistent with the current predominant economic reality. This has made it difficult to come up with better, reliable, and sustainable policies. The historical design was adopted in reviewing educational development under the leadership of the four presidents of Kenya. So far, the first and the second presidents remain known as the ones who have brought the most educational changes in the country. The new 2-6-6-3 education system emphasizes continuous assessment tests rather than the end of cycle tests and is more competencies-based than exam-based (as is the 8-4-4 system). The policy designers in the education sector should comprehend and embrace education policies since they are expected to give effective leadership and management practices in the development of education. Good education development can only be realized when a country tries to separate educational policies from national politics, clear stipulation of educational policies and their role in national development and a sound implementation of educational reforms. This article digs deeper into education policies and implementation in Kenya in an attempt to provide recommendations and suggestions to improve the educational sector.

This paper examines the implementation of Singapore’s landmark policy, ‘Thinking Schools, learning Nation’ (TSLN), in developing ‘thinking students’ through the prism of student voice. In the context of twenty-first century education and the growing importance of student voice in education, this paper argues that the time might be right to ‘disrupt’ Singapore’s education status quo and incorporate meaningful student voice in education policies. Instead of perceiving students as mere subjects of educational policy enactment, and seeing policy as something that is done to them, it should be reconceptualised as something which is done with them; importantly, students should be recast as key co-agents of educational change, consistent with TSLN’s reconceptualization of learners as ‘thinking students’. Basing its arguments on findings from a qualitative case study of students’ perceptions and schooling experiences of critical thinking in TSLN, this paper considers the case for the inclusion of significant student voice in Singapore’s educational policy reforms. It fills gaps in research on student voices in Singapore’s educational reforms and TSLN’s research from students’ perspective. The paper suggests that the inclusion of student voice in educational reform might be the next landmark step in ‘disrupting’ its educational landscape after the ‘big bang’ of TSLN.

Bhutan’s developmental priorities have evolved to attune with the national needs and global environment. The education policies have also changed, as evident from several policy documents and guidelines. It is apparent that the education policies and practices are primarily influenced by Western thoughts and ideologies. This transpired from the country’s emerging engagements with the international actors and its resultant phenomenon of policy borrowing and emulations of best practices. While sharing educational philosophies and policies are pervasive, without careful attention to the critical ideas of contextualisation and appropriate recognition of local values, policy borrowing can be counterproductive to national aspirations. With the rapid socio-economic development in the country as it emerges as an active participant in global affairs, the Bhutanese youths are exposed to foreign influences and cultures. There is a potential risk of losing the country’s rich repository of value systems if the education policies are not adapted to re-emphasise on inculcation of core Bhutanese values in education systems. Given the education reform agenda espoused by His Majesty Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck, the 5th King of Bhutan, this paper reviews the national education policy documents with specific reference to the Quarterly Education Policy Guidelines from 1988 to 2020, which is considered an equivalent of policy directives in the absence of an Education Act. The paper populates on an apparent loss of the local values to the burgeoning Western models for educational efficiencies. It renews an emphasis on the traditional values in the education reform policies for Bhutan. Keywords: Globalization, local values, national ideologies, education, reform

With the release of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2003 results in late 2004, Finland became the focus of international admiration. Soon after the study’s release, scholars, journalists, and government officials from around the world flocked to the small Nordic nation in search of the “secret” of its educational accomplishment (Asahi News 2002). While Finland enjoyed international acclaim, Japan—the former exemplar of educational excellence—was in the midst of serious soul-searching about its own educational system. The Japanese “academic achievement crisis debate” (gakuryoku teika ronsō) erupted in the late 1990s, generating a national moral panic over declining academic performance (see Takayama 2007). The PISA 2003 results were released at the peak of this controversy, and Japan’s “drop” in ranking in some areas from PISA 2000 to PISA 2003 led many observers to believe that the suspected scholastic crisis had been confirmed (see Takayama 2008c). In the aftermath of the PISA shock, Japanese journalists, scholars, and government officials followed the international trend, traveling to Finland in search of the Finnish secret (Fujita 2005). Meanwhile, various Japanese professional educational associations invited Finnish education scholars and former and incumbent ministers of education to learn from the world’s best education system (Asahi News 2005b; Tanaka 2005b; Kitagawa 2006 In addition, many individuals, organizations, and publishers were quick to capitalize on the “Finnish boom” (Watanabe 2005, 12). Tatsuo Kitagawa, formerly of the Japanese embassy in Helsinki and presently the chairperson of the Finnish Method Promotion Association (Finrando Mesoddo Fukyū Kyōkai) translated a series of literacy textbooks used in Finnish schools, selling more than 100,000 copies (Yomiuri News 2007b). Kitagawa and other experts

This paper deals with the extensively documented crisis regarding present transnational education and curriculum policy and leadership practices from a curriculum theory point of view. This crisis, which the Finnish education policy analyst Pasi Sahlberg has characterized with the acronym GERM (Global Education Reform Model), “the virus that is killing education”, is considered through the lenses of two major curriculum theory paradigms, Anglo-American Curriculum and Northern European Bildung/Didaktik traditions. Bluntly stated, the Anglo-American curricular perspective reflects an (obsolete) image of natural science through behaviorist and cognitivist theories, which has led to administrative and political transformations based on the principles of accountability, standardization and privatization. In contrast, the Bildung tradition conceives of education and educational science as explicitly political rather than camouflaging politics by positioning science as neutral. This tradition of thought, however, has been experiencing an intellectual extinction in even its home ground of Germany. Astonishingly similar education policy outcomes to those that followed the Sputnik shock in the USA have also occurred following the German PISA shock of 2001. Since then, the Northern European Bildung camp has adopted accountability, standardization, and privatization as key drivers of their respective education reforms, with Finland, thus far, the solitary exception. The powerful reductionism of the current political tenet “economic thought is coterminous with rationality,” adopted by neoliberal education and curriculum policy makers, may be corroding our images of democratic society and education as a vehicle of and for democracy. This paper presents examples and implies a further need for critical reactivation of the symbolic legacy of Bildung as an educational springboard for a democratic project that would identify broader social visions and moral and political considerations beyond the instrumentality of “raising test scores” and would recognize these as essential elements of sound education policy making. Dr. Tero Henrik Autio has served as Professor of Curriculum Studies and Teacher Education at the University of Tampere, Finland and as invited International Professor of Curriculum Theory at Tallinn University, Estonia. Most recently, he has worked with the European Union to enhance PhD studies in education in post-Soviet Baltic countries. Autio has previously worked as classroom teacher in Finland specializing in math education, as a special education teacher in a child and youth psychiatric ward in Tampere University Hospital, and as a teacher educator in a vocational teacher education college in Jyväskylä, Finland. He is Vice President of the European Association for Curriculum Studies and co-chaired the Second IAACS Conference in Tampere in 2006. During his years as a student, he worked as a certified car mechanic and long distance truck driver. He loves architecture, theater, classical, pop and crossover music, interesting discussions, and curriculum theory.