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The Language of Neoliberal Education Ed Letnik XXIX, številka 1–2, 2018 Revija za teorijo in raziskave vzgoje in izobraževanja Šolsko polje The Language of Neoliberal Education ed. Mitja Sardoč Šolsko polje Revija za teorijo in raziskave vzgoje in izobraževanja Letnik XXIX, številka 1–2, 2018 Šolsko polje je mednarodna revija za teorijo ter raziskave vzgoje in izobraževanja z mednarodnim uredniškim odbor om. Objavlja znanstvene in strokovne članke s širšega področja vzgoje in izobraževanja ter edukacij- skih raziskav (filozofija vzgoje, sociologija izobraževanja, uporabna epistemologija, razvojna psihologija, -pe dagogika, andragogika, pedagoška metodologija itd.), pregledne članke z omenjenih področij ter recenzije tako domačih kot tujih monografij s področja vzgoje in izobraževanja. Revija izhaja trikrat letno. Izdaja joSlo - vensko društvo raziskovalcev šolskega polja. Poglavitni namen revije je prispevati k razvoju edukacijskih ved in in- terdisciplinarnemu pristopu k teoretičnim in praktičnim vprašanjem vzgoje in izobraževanja. V tem okviru revija posebno pozornost namenja razvijanju slovenske znanstvene in strokovne terminologije ter konceptov na področju vzgoje in izobraževanja ter raziskovalnim paradigmam s področja edukacijskih raziskav v okvi- ru družboslovno-humanističnih ved. Uredništvo: Valerija Vendramin, Zdenko Kodelja, Darko Štrajn, Alenka Gril, Igor Ž. Žagar, Eva Klemenčič in Mitja Sardoč (vsi: Pedagoški inštitut, Ljubljana) Glavni urednik: Marjan Šimenc (Pedagoški inštitut, Ljubljana) Odgovorni urednik: Mitja Sardoč (Pedagoški inštitut, Ljubljana) Uredniški odbor: Michael W. Apple (University of Wisconsin, Madison, USA), Eva D. Bahovec (Filozofska fakulteta, Univerza v Ljubljani), Andreja Barle-Lakota (Urad za šolstvo, Ministrstvo za šolstvo in šport RS), Valentin Bucik (Filozofska fakulteta, Univerza v Ljubljani), Harry Brighouse (University of Wisconsin, Ma- dison, USA), Randall Curren (University of Rochester, USA), Slavko Gaber (Pedagoška fakulteta, Univerza v Ljubljani), Milena Ivanuš-Grmek (Pedagoška fakulteta, Univerza v Mariboru), Russell Jacoby (University of California, Los Angeles), Janez Justin † (Pedagoški inštitut, Ljubljana), Stane Košir (Pedagoška fakulteta, Univerza v Ljubljani), Janez Kolenc † (Pedagoški inštitut, Ljubljana), Ljubica Marjanovič-Umek (Filozofska fakulteta, Univerza v Ljubljani), Rastko Močnik (Filozofska fakulteta, Univerza v Ljubljani), Zoran Pavlo- vić (Svetovalni center za otroke, mladostnike in starše, Ljubljana), Drago B. Rotar (Fakulteta za humanistič- ne študije, Univerza na Primorskem), Harvey Siegel (University of Miami, USA), Marjan Šetinc (Sloven- sko društvo raziskovalcev šolskega polja, Ljubljana), Pavel Zgaga (Pedagoška fakulteta, Univerza v Ljubljani), Maja Zupančič (Filozofska fakulteta, Univerza v Ljub ljani), Robi Kroflič (Filozofska fakulteta, Univerza v Ljubljani), Marie-Hélene Estéoule Exel (Universite Stendhal Grenoble III) Lektor (slovenski jezik), tehnični urednik, oblikovanje in prelom: Jonatan Vinkler Lektor (angleški jezik): Jason Brendon Batson Izdajatelja: Slovensko društvo raziskovalcev šolskega polja in Pedagoški inštitut © Slovensko društvo raziskovalcev šolskega polja in Pedagoški inštitut Tisk: Grafika 3000 d.o.o., Dob Naklada: 400 izvodov Revija Šolsko polje je vključena v naslednje indekse in baze podatkov: Contents Pages in Education; EBSCO; Edu- cation Research Abstracts; International Bibliography of the Social Sciences (IBSS); Linguistics and Language Beha- vior Abstracts (LLBA); Multicultural Education Abstracts; Pais International; ProQuest Social Sciences Journal, Re- search into Higher Education Abstracts; Social Services Abstracts; Sociological Abstracts; Worldwide Political Science Abstracts Šolsko polje izhaja s finančno podporo Pedagoškega inštituta in Javne agencije za raziskovalno dejavnost Republike Slovenije. Tiskana izdaja: issn 1581–6036 Izdaja na zgoščenki: issn 1581–6052 Spletna izdaja: issn 1581–6044 Letnik XXIX, številka 1–2, 2018 Revija za teorijo in raziskave vzgoje in izobraževanja Šolsko polje The Language of Neoliberal Education ed. Mitja Sardoč Vsebina/Content Mitja Sardoč 5 The Language of Neoliberal Education: Problems, Challenges and Opportunities Vasco d’Agnese 11 Concealment and Advertising: Unraveling OECD’s Educational Rhetoric Mark Olssen 33 Neoliberalism and Laissez-faire:The Retreat from Naturalism Michael A. Peters 57 Neoliberalism as Political Discourse: The Political Arithmetic ofHomo oeconomicus Rodolfo Leyva 77 Unpacking the Usage and Implications of Neoliberal Language in the Russell Group’s Education Strategies Mitja Sardoč 97 The Language of Neoliberal Education: An Interviw with Henry Giroux Urška Štremfel 107 European Neoliberal Discourse and Slovenian Educational Space Sarah Hayes and Petar Jandrić 127 Resisting the Iron Cage of ‘the Student Experience’ 145 Povzetki/Abstracts 155 Avtorji/Authors 3 The Language of Neoliberal Education: Problems, Challenges and Opportunities Mitja Sardoč or over two decades now, neoliberalism has been at the forefront of discussions not only in economy and finance but has gradually infil- Ftrated our vocabulary in a number of areas as diverse as governance studies (Wacquant, 2009), criminology (Bell, 2011), health care (Glynos, 2014), jurisprudence (Grewal & Purdy, 2014), identity politics (Chun, 2016), education (Grek, 2009) etc. Its economistic language associated with the promotion of effectiveness and efficiency combined with indica- tors and other empirical data claimed to have established a ‘culture of ob- jectivity’ (Porter, 1995). As Christopher W. Chun emphasizes, [n]eoliberal policies and practices have attempted to remake our every- day lives so that every aspect is minutely measured, assessed and evalu- ated as ‘outputs’, in accordance with manufacturing-based standards of production, and defined as ‘best practices’, which is another term adopt- ed from corporate culture now widely used in education. (Chun, 2016: 558). In fact, education has been at the very centre of the neoliberal pub- lic policy agenda as it allegedly represents one of the main indicators of future economic growth and individual well-being. Its – for many schol- ars dystopian – ‘vision’ of education as an investment is based on a [deter- ministic] assumption that ‘better educational outcomes are a strong pre- dictor of economic growth’ (OECD, 2010: 3). Pupils’ achievements is said to represent an indicator of the ‘future talent pools’ (PISA, 2012: 26) and should therefore be a valid or sufficient indicator of the [economic] success in the future [assumption of the translatability of learning achievements 5 šolsko polje, letnik xxix, številka 1–2 in economic performance]. This assumption – most visible in studies dis- cussing international large-scale student assessments, e.g. PISA etc. – has brought to the forefront of both media and political attention the vari- ous aspects of teaching and learning. Large-scale assessments and quanti- tative data in general have thus become an important mechanism of the ‘neo-liberal toolkit’ associated with the process of ‘governing by numbers’ (Grek, 2007). While the analysis of the neoliberal agenda in education is well doc- umented (e.g. d’Agnese, 2017; Giroux, 2014; Olssen, 2010; Peters, 2011), the examination of the language of neoliberal education has been at the fringes of scholarly interest (Holborow, 2015). In particular, the expan- sion of the neoliberal vocabulary with egalitarian ideas such as fairness (Bøyum, 2014), justice and disadvantage (Gazeley, 2018), well-being etc. has received [at best] only limited attention. For example, one of the lat- est additions to the neoliberal vocabulary has been the idea of talent. For much of its history, the notion of talent has been associated with the idea of ‘careers open to talent’. Its emancipatory promise of upward social mo- bility has ultimately radically transformed the distribution of advantaged social positions and has had a lasting influence on the very idea of social status itself. Nevertheless, despite its emancipatory link with the equali- ty of opportunity and social mobility itself, the notion of talent came to be affiliated also with some of the most pressing contemporary issues as- sociated with (in)equality including the ‘ownership’ of talents (Goldman, 1987), desert (Sher, 2012), brain drain (Brock in Blake, 2015), ‘war for tal- ent’ (Michaels, Handfield-Jones in Axelrod, 2001), talent management (Lewis i& Heckman, 2006), ‘taxation’ of talents (Hasen, 2006; Roemer, 1996 [ch. 6]; Zelenak, 2006) etc. This shift of emphasis in the use and application of language and ideas firmly grounded in some of the well-known slogans (and other buz- zwords) has had a transformative influence on our way of thinking about public policy in general. Yet, this shift of emphasis from concepts and ide- as that are part of the ‘standard’ vocabulary of neoliberal education, e.g. effectiveness, efficiency, commodification, privatization, deregulation etc. to concepts and ideas that are part of a more egalitarian vocabulary, not only put large-scale assessments and quantitative data as its main product at the very centre of education policy-making but – perhaps equally im- portant – has had a profound effect on education in general. This journal special issue ofŠolsko polje entitled ‘The Language of Neoliberal Education’ brings together both conceptual and empirical pa- pers as well as an interview that addresses a wide range of problems and challenges associated with the language of neoliberalism in education 6 m. sardoč ■the language
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