Neoliberal Policy Reforms Research Articles

Wolfgang Streeck on the Origins of Capitalist Crisis

Abstract Shortly after the financial crisis of 2008, Wolfgang Streeck emerged as a highly influential and ambitious critical theorist of capitalism and crisis. Streeck's crisis theory of capitalism is built around an account of neoliberal policy reform as a family of responses to economic upheavals that first emerged during the 1970s. Based on an analysis of four major shocks all occurring in that decade, I argue that Streeck's crisis theory is excessively economistic in its understanding of the crisis tendencies that first propelled neoliberal reform and insufficiently attentive to the global context of their emergence. Theorising the significance of this pivotal historical moment requires more attention to the conflictual entanglements between societies of the Global South and North in the context of decolonisation, war and revolution, and a more nuanced appreciation of the political context of economic reform.

Participatory politics and education policy reform: publics and histories

ABSTRACT In this theoretical article, we respond to a common education policy discourse that represents community participation in educational policy-making as an essentially rational solution to policy problems and as inherently progressive and democratic. We propose that conceptualising participatory politics as ‘publics’ challenges this discourse and provides new openings for understanding community participation in education policy reform as modes of worldmaking. Historicising the participative turn within the key decades of the 1970s and 1980s, we argue that mobilisations of participatory politics in education reform are complicated by the existence of participatory reactionary or conservative politics and by participatory politics that are either fleeting and unsuccessful, or exceed or refuse the sovereignty of the liberal democratic state. We propose that working with the theories of the publics can enable a richer understanding of the history of neoliberal education policy reform and of present and future aspirations for participatory education policy practices.

Impacts of neoliberal school reforms policy on students with disabilities in Nepal

This article argues that special and inclusive education policies in Nepal have been influenced by neoliberal policy reforms. The study employs discourse analysis as a theoretical perspective to analyse the effects of market-based schooling practices on students with disabilities in Nepal. The findings of this study are informed to some extent by the outcomes of the doctoral research project (Thapaliya, 2018). Data was collected through policies and documents. A selection of key education policies and documents between 1990 to 2020 were examined and analysed. One core theme and five sub-themes were identified from the data analysis. Disability as a resource management issue was a main theme. (i) Managing resources; (ii) resource allocation criteria; (iii) professional experts deciding resource funds; (iv) competing for limited resources; and (v) competition and school choice were sub-themes. The available evidence signals that the marketisation model of education does not assist students with disabilities adequately. The findings of this study reveal that the current policy and practice signal changes in government structure rather than working to fulfil these commitments in the everyday practice of students with disabilities. The limitations of the study and recommendations of this research are also discussed.

An Author without a Nation: Fictional Renderings of Leopoldo Lugones in Argentine Literature

Abstract This article examines three novels that use fiction to revise the figure of the Argentine author Leopoldo Lugones: Ricardo Piglia’s Respiración artificial (1980), C. E. Feiling’s Un poeta nacional (1993), and César Aira’s Lugones (2020). These three novels present different portrayals of Lugones, which also mirror their opposing views of the Argentine literary tradition. Piglia, Feiling, and Aira look back at the so-called national poet when self-fashioning themselves as writers and outlining a literary project in a (post)dictatorial scenario. In a cultural field marked by the effects of state terror and neoliberal reform policies, these fictional renderings of Lugones become a means of reflecting on the political past and the future of literature. Ultimately, I argue that Respiración artificial, Un poeta nacional, and Lugones devise a figure of the Argentine author decoupled from the mission of consolidating a national identity that Lugones epitomized for nearly half a century.

From creating to confronting racial hierarchies: The evolving role of the US state in land policy

AbstractFrom systemically dispossessing Indigenous people of their territory for Euro‐American settlement to routinely denying African American farmers operating loans in the 20th century, the US government's complicity in creating racial hierarchies in terms of land access is well documented. Less understood is how land policies oriented towards racial equity, namely, the Justice for Black Farmers Act (JBFA), and other initiatives that deal with land access as well as addressing racism more broadly, emerged during recent decades. In this article, we argue that such initiatives resulted from Black‐led organizations and other farmer advocacy allies responding to neoliberal policy reforms. Concretely, even as these reforms destabilized farm economies, they also led to a decentralization of agricultural policy administration, which, in turn, created opportunities for community‐based organizations to influence land governance. We make this argument after presenting a three‐part periodization of the evolution of US land policy, starting with the emergence of racial hierarchies, then the period of partial reforms that began during the New Deal and, finally, the era of neoliberal reform.

Neoliberalism, ‘honour’-based regulatory frameworks of accounting and accountability in a social context: An examination of the role of accounting in the management of subsidies on petroleum products in Nigeria

Nigeria subsidises the cost of petroleum products for its citizens, but corruption means that the cost is rising and to maintain the subsidy, Nigeria has sought financial support from international financial institutions, such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. However, this support is contingent on neoliberal economic policy reform, in which the World Bank calls for the removal of petroleum product subsidies and the implementation of Western ‘honour’-based regulatory frameworks, that is, International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS), to improve transparency and accountability. Considering endemic corruption in the Nigerian cultural and socio-political context, where political elites can override any rule and politicians, public officials, and professionals can intentionally manipulate accounting records, we examine the limits of governance/accounting frameworks and explore the boundaries of accountants’ oversight function. In particular, we discuss the impact of ‘honour’-based regulatory frameworks, such as IFRS and IPSAS, on transparency and accountability in the Nigerian oil and gas sector and in the government subsidy programme. This study challenges the neoliberal assumption that Western ‘honour’-based IFRS and IPSAS, widely adopted in developed countries where fraud is rare, can improve transparency and accountability in developing economies like Nigeria, where corruption is endemic.

The primacy of politics in neoliberal universal health coverage policy reform. A commentary on ‘financing and provision of healthcare for two billion people in low-income nations: Is the cooperative healthcare model a solution?” by William C Hsiao and Winnie Yip

The primacy of politics in neoliberal universal health coverage policy reform. A commentary on ‘financing and provision of healthcare for two billion people in low-income nations: Is the cooperative healthcare model a solution?” by William C Hsiao and Winnie Yip

Speaking Back to the Neoliberal Community College

This article explores the complexities and contradictions of neoliberal policy reforms on fifteen Black and Latino male community college students who participated in a qualitative, longitudinal study at Urban Community College. Though the conventional wisdom on community colleges assumes that more and better neoliberal policies will lead to improved outcomes and greater equity for educationally disenfranchised students, this study illustrates how the policies that are at the heart of the college completion agenda, such as continuous full-time enrollment, on-time graduation, and guided curricular pathways, were implicated in the study participants’ academic challenges.

‘We’re not robots!’: the interaction of co-operativism and neoliberalism for students at a Co-op academy

The debate regarding the ability of co-operativism to challenge the consequences of neoliberal policy reform in UK schooling remains concerned with the organisation and policy of co-operative academies. This article follows school research which applies a Foucauldian approach to power to explore and identify violently unequal consequences of neoliberal reform. In considering the interaction of co-operativism and neoliberalism in the experience of students at a Co-operative Academies Trust school, through semi-structured interviews with vignettes, it shows co-operativism being exploited to shape neoliberal governmentality. Whilst participants draw on their co-operative schooling to challenge notions of meritocracy and success, co-operativism is ultimately instrumental in the infliction of symbolic violence, as students self-govern towards racialised, classed and gendered ideals. Applying a Foucauldian lens and centring the experience of students are thus vital to the evaluation of co-operativism in schooling.

The effects of neoliberalism: Teachers’ experiences and ethical dilemmas to policy initiatives within vocational education and training in Australia

Neoliberal policy reforms have had a marked influence on nearly every aspect of education, including the enrolment practices employed by institutions, teaching and assessment practices, and even the outcomes for students and society. There is a widespread expectation that teachers should contribute to quality outcomes for students along with their moral/ethical development and character formation while at the same time behaving ethically in the currently challenging environment of the education sector, including the Vocational Education and Training (VET) sector. However, this apparent pressure for maintaining quality education while simultaneously conforming to the ethicality of professional practices in the context of rapid policy changes of a neoliberal sort masks considerable controversy around the meaning of quality education with respect to both moral/ethical behaviour in education and the appropriate forms of practice that would constitute this area of education. A recent research project into the impact of the changing contemporary cultural context of VET on the creation of moral dilemmas facing VET teachers in their work has identified the VET teachers’ perspectives of the ethical dilemmas experienced, by identifying the tensions between competing values and the resulting interactions. The research design for the study drew primarily on exploratory and discursive interviews with 18 VET teachers in South-East Queensland, selected from those responding to a call for participation in the study. The study pointed to the value of dilemmas as constructs through which to generate knowledge of ethical conflicts arising from contextual changes in policy. Four drivers that they attributed to causing those dilemmas were identified: changing immigration rules, changing funding requirements, changing culture and philosophy of RTOs, and inadequate teacher preparation. In each of these respects, the ambitious business expectations engendered by neoliberal restructuring and reform in recent years can be seen as articulating or presupposing values pertaining to standards of practice and performance of the RTO, which in turn can be seen to compromise traditional norms associated with teacher professionalism. It is with these values and conflicts that we are concerned in this paper.

Negotiating and Contesting Confucian Workplace Culture in South Korea

ABSTRACT The South Korean workforce faces conflicting pressures arising from intensified global competition, neoliberal policy reforms and contending cultural norms concerning appropriate workplace behaviours. Demographic, policy and economic changes have destabilised steeply hierarchical norms understood as ‘Confucian’ or ‘traditional’, with calls for flexibility, informality and reduced reciprocal loyalty between employers and employees. Nonetheless, this study suggests that some South Korean firms are attempting to maintain hierarchical practices and strategically deploy traditional cultural norms, many of which are embedded in linguistic practices. Based on intensive observation within three workplaces, we find that firms can sometimes actively construct an alignment between Confucian-based culture and workplace practices that induce significant commitment from employees. Furthermore, practices and expectations anchored in understandings of what is traditional exert a surprising influence in the workplaces we studied. However, many employees wrestle with the contradictions between traditional cultural norms and demands for greater individual autonomy.

Primary teachers’ experiences of neo-liberal education reform in England: ‘Nothing is ever good enough’

ABSTRACT As the global neo-liberal reform movement in education continues to evolve, so does the simultaneous transfiguration of the profile and status of primary school teachers in England. Reform continues to delineate the aims and purpose of primary education in increasingly essentialist terms. This paper explores English primary school teachers’ perceptions and experiences of teaching, and of being a teacher, in a period of considerable change. Extending the existing research literature about primary school teachers, it explores the progressively strategic nature of policy enactment and the tactics employed by teachers to manage conflicting demands. The paper draws upon rich qualitative data from two sets of interviews with 22 primary teachers employed in the South-East of England. Thematic analysis facilitated findings about teachers’ encounters with, and responses to, neo-liberal policy reform, notably in relation to accountability and managerialism. The view that ‘nothing is ever good enough’ reflects recurrent data affirming the relationship between school leadership and teachers’ demoralisation, as well as perceived reputational decline more broadly. Findings highlight the emergence of the primary practitioner as ‘tactician’, and of a particular brand of survivalism necessary for a context that acts to pedagogically and philosophically constrain the purpose of primary education.

Politics of Development in Pakistan: From the Post-Independence Modernization Project to ‘Vision 2025’

This article critically analyses Pakistan’s development project since its independence in 1947 up till Vision 2025 of 2014. Vision 2025 aspires to ‘inclusive growth’ through the expansion of the market as the basis for a ‘people-centric’ approach to development. Based on a critical evaluation of Pakistan’s development trajectory, I argue that a reliance on economic growth via liberal capitalism to address poverty has failed in Pakistan. Post-independence aspirations of decent livelihoods became disrupted by the development project, which evolved through Cold War politics. Premised upon the privileging of liberal capitalism, this modernization project was executed by authoritarian regimes that initiated new processes of dispossession and accentuated existent inequalities. Moreover, a critical analysis of Pakistan’s development crises must consider how poverty intersects with social inequality justified through zat or caste to reproduce entrenched positions of privilege and disadvantage. Mainstream Pakistani society comprises an efficacious trope of inequality normalized through the ‘othering’ of poor families, resistance to which is misrepresented as a lack of character and industry. Impoverished communities bear disproportionate costs of development, which compel them to find shelter in segregated communities in slums and earn a living as servants, vendors and through begging, including children on the streets. In the wake of neo-liberal policy reforms, the Benazir Income Support Programme provides temporary monetary relief to some but leaves intact the underlying causes of worsening inequality. A critical discussion of Pakistan’s development trajectory challenges the ideological premises of Vision 2025 and its promise of universal wellbeing.

‘When the hurley-burley's done, when the battle's lost and won’: exploring the value and appropriation of silence and quietude in academia

ABSTRACT The intensification of the working life of academics in the corporate world of higher education shaped by new public management, is the backdrop for an exploration of the appropriation of opportunities for silence and quietude through the operation of internalised disciplines of self-imposed control. The paper includes a review of selected literature on the effects of neoliberal education policy reform on the working lives of academics in higher education. Specifically it considers the intensity and pressures and the possibilities for academics to find silence, quietude and respite from the 'hurley-burley', allowing them to 'stand back’ from this for a time. The influence of dominant market rationalities in higher education on academic working life is explored, with a particular focus on three national contexts – England, Sweden and Italy. Two vignettes illustrate some of the possibilities and limitations of silence and quietude in academic working life. In the paper, the authors have also examined how the value of such opportunities can be eroded when subjugated for the purposes of the neoliberal academy and the drive for efficiency and performativity.

The Family Farming Culture of Dairy Farmers: A Case‐Study of the Illawarra Region, New South Wales

AbstractSince the 1980s, many parts of rural Australia have experienced persistent financial difficulties. However, there is a lack of account on how farmers have improved business performance while maintaining traditional farming culture. By focusing on dairy farmers in the Illawarra region in New South Wales, Australia, this study examines the evolution of family farming culture under global agricultural change. Dairy farming dominates Illawarra agriculture, and has been constantly pressured by neoliberal policy reform and adverse market conditions. This study draws on public data, semi‐structured interviews, and participant observation. In recent decades, dairy farming has shown a trend of declining farm numbers. A long‐standing culture of family farming has existed in the Illawarra and continues to shape farmers’ lifestyle and business. Farmer interviewees shared this culture, and continued farming partly for non‐economic reasons. However, under economic pressures farmers both compromised some elements of this traditional farming culture, and drew on the strategic value of other elements.

Confronting Scale: A Strategy of Solidarity in Urban Social Movements, New York City and Beyond

Emerging attention to the spatial dynamics of political contention points to the spatially situated nature of mobilization, and, in turn, how space is socially produced through collective action. Drawing from interviews and archival research, this article examines an urban university social movement organization and its relationship to a larger social movement network in an urban context. In response to university administrators’ adoption of neoliberal policy reform, student activists challenged sociospatial boundaries in their organizing across scale—in their university, the city, region, and across the nation. By adopting a strategy of solidarity, student activists collapsed the boundaries of the university and transformed it into a hub of Leftist social movement organizing for the city and beyond, redefining scale. Findings suggest that the development of urban social movement networks can be understood as a scalar strategy of solidarity for building social movement persistence and power. This social movement network emerged in response to market and State redefinition of urban meaning at the transition to the 21st century. This article illustrates how the sociospatial formation of urban social movement networks challenges the boundaries of contention.

From shame to blame: institutionalising oppression through the moralisation of mental distress in austerity England

This paper interrogates qualitative data regarding the changing experiences of mental health service and welfare state interventions for those who self-identify as experiencing long-term mental distress. We focus on austerity-related reforms in the English welfare and mental health policy architecture to explore the socio-cultural and material bases of benefit claims-making in relation to long-term illness and incapacity. Recent neoliberal social policy reforms contest the ontological status of mental distress, in effect recasting distress as a ‘moral’ status. This tendency is reinforced via three primary dynamics in contemporary mental health and welfare policy: the delegitimisation of sick role status in relation to mental distress; the foregrounding of individual responsibility and concomitant re-orientation of services towards self-help; and an increasing punitive conditionality. These intersecting processes represent an institutionalisation of ‘blame’ in various policy contexts (Scambler in Sociol Health Illn 31(3): 441–455, 2009; Sociol Rev Monogr 66(4):766–782, 2018), the moral stigmatisation of mental distress and escalating experiences of oppression for mental health service users and welfare recipients. Shifting conceptions of distress are thereby entwined with transformations in social policy regimes and political economies. Presenting distress as a personal failure legitimates austerity-related restrictions on benefit and service entitlements as part of a wider project of neoliberal welfare state transformation.

Recognising the caring capabilities of birth families of removed children: Towards a critical policy agenda

Vulnerable families are subject to a myriad of State interventions. In this article, we analyse how interventions of the neo-liberal State may undermine, rather than activate, the caring capabilities of vulnerable families across the life course. We define ‘vulnerable families’ as financially disadvantaged families with complex and enduring needs. Drawing on examples from Australia, England and the USA, we consider how neo-liberal policy reforms may weaken the caring capabilities of these families. We focus our analysis on vulnerable families who have been subject to one of the most intrusive forms of state intervention: the removal of a child. We explain Bourdieu’s concept of ‘misrecognition’ and outline its utility for analysing the neo-liberal state’s failure to recognise and develop the caring function of birth families. We consider the implications of this analysis for the development of a critical research and policy agenda with vulnerable families.

FAMILY, SCHOOL AND THE MASS PRODUCTION OF PARENTING ADVICE

ABSTRACTThe underlying thesis of much popular parenting discourse in circulation in western Anglophone countries is that parenting labour has intensified historically, notably in regard to schooling, and that we are witnessing new kinds of parental attitudes and strategies. A related argument holds that parents, especially middle-class parents, have become entrepreneurial agents in their children’s education, and that this activity is a consequence of global neoliberal policy reform. This paper examines the intensification thesis through a study of popular parenting advice in the late pre-neoliberal era, the 1960s and 1970s. It proposes that the rise of intensive school parenting must be understood not only through policy histories of competition, choice and marketisation but also through histories of domestic life, of the material and affective activities of ‘home-making’. The focus is on a collection of parenting advice (including advertisements) published in one mass-market women’s magazine, the Australian Women’s Weekly. Such publications were, the paper argues, significant and exemplary in disseminating forms of advice that encouraged parents, especially mothers, to discover and develop new repertoires of educational child-rearing competencies and to consider themselves as competitors in the educational arena, on behalf of their own children.

Between Environmental Change and Neoliberalism: The Effects of Oil Palm Production on Livelihood Resilience

Rural communities worldwide are increasingly confronted with the simultaneous impacts of environmental change dynamics and processes of economic restructuring that diminish traditional sources of state support while shifting investments toward large-scale intensive production models. A key question in this context is how livelihoods are affected by these interacting forces of change and whether new production models can contribute to resilience at the household and community scales. Here we examine the impacts of oil palm production on marginal rural communities in Mexico that have experienced both the economic changes associated with neoliberal policy reforms and the dynamics of environmental change. We find that oil palm production can contribute to livelihood resilience when community members participate in its management and governance and when production is associated with state support, but that the kinds of neoliberal policies promoting oil palm expansion may exacerbate existing community vulnerabilities in the face of environmental change.