Toward a Critical Deliberative Strategy for Addressing Ideology in Educational Policy Processes

Abstract

Is it possible and desirable to transcend ideological perspectives within educational policy research and decision making? If so, what would it entail and how should we proceed? At heart, the relation among research, ideology, and policy may be characterized as a complex and interconnected web. The common view of this web is that good social and educational policy decisions are generally made based on research evidence and largely independent of ideological positions. However, it is rather more likely that research and political ideology interact throughout the research process, from the choice of research question, to the organization that provides funding for the research, to the way that findings are interpreted and used. The purpose of this article is to propose a promising strategy that can be utilized by policymakers in the process of making educational policy decisions.