Policy in social context: a collapse of holistic planning in education

Abstract

This article examines the impact of ‘extra‐educational’ factors on a holistic policy initiative in education: the collapse of the further education policy in the Australian state of Tasmania, an initiative which sought to integrate technical education, adult education and senior secondary colleges into one new organization. The article introduces a ‘phenomenological’ methodology which attempts to give credence to the diverse views of ‘organizational reality’ shared by different groups of participants in the policy. It provides a hermeneutic account of policy failure which lends support to the Popperian view that holistic social or educational planning is a naive and dangerous approach to introducing large‐scale social change.