The politics of literacy in the context of large‐scale education reform

Abstract

In this paper, I will consider the lessons that can be learnt about literacy policy and its role in large‐scale education reform programmes, with particular reference to policy‐making in England since the election of New Labour in 1997. New Labour’s promise to the electorate in 1997 was that state‐funded education could be fixed and turned into a high‐quality delivery system from which all would benefit. It could be fixed by direct intervention from politicians committed to overhauling the public sector and applying new principles which would see standards rise. The National Literacy Strategy (NLS) was the main vehicle for change, whilst the target for achievement in literacy became one of the most public and obvious measures of the government’s success in reforming education. Over the decade that followed New Labour’s election, early optimism about what government could achieve has been tempered by the twists and turn of events, which saw the education performance data plateau just short of the government’s targets, and the NLS morph into the Primary National Strategy as it gradually moved from the centre of political action to a more peripheral position. Within government itself the NLS’s progress has acted as an important catalyst for reflection on what works in public sector reform more generally and the challenges those running such programmes face. This paper takes as its central points of analysis the evolution of literacy policy within the policy cycle. The paper reflects on the array of actors within government and beyond who have been involved in trying to make that policy work, or who may have acted as (dis)interested bystanders commenting from the sidelines. What are the lessons that can be learnt which might contribute to the development of literacy policy elsewhere?