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A policy sociology reflection on school reform in England: from the ‘Third Way’ to the ‘Big Society’

2012; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 44; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/00220620.2011.634498

1478-7431

Bob Lingard, Sam Sellar,

Diverse Education Studies and Reforms

Abstract This article presents a policy sociology reflection on Bernard Barker's book, The Pendulum Swings: Transforming School Reform. The book represents Barker's attempt to intervene in education policy during the lead-up to the 2010 UK general election and is framed by what he imagined might be possible under a new Conservative government. Barker draws inspiration from the Red Tory communitarian position articulated by Phillip Blond. In hindsight, we are less sanguine about these possibilities in the context of the Coalition government and its ongoing response to the ongoing financial crises. Indeed, what has emerged is a rearticulated neo-liberalism in the guise of 'Big Society' rhetoric. We agree with Barker's critical deconstruction of the five illusions underpinning New Labour schooling policy, but argue for a broader agenda of redistribution, both in social policy and with respect to schools. Policy needs to recognise and support teachers and good pedagogies, and we also see a pressing need to rethink richer forms of educational accountability. All of this must be located within a politics that pursues a new social imaginary. Nonetheless, we commend Barker's contribution towards post neo-liberal thinking in respect of school policy, specifically in England, but with relevance to other locations and systems. Keywords: education policyschool reformBig SocietyNew Labourneo-liberalism Notes 1Bernard Barker, The Pendulum Swings: Transforming School Reform (London: Trentham Books, 2010). 2We take Barker's notion of 'hyper-accountability' to refer to changed and intensified practices of public accountability that emerged over the past three decades. For example, Ranson argues that since the late 1970s there has been a shift in education governance from professional accountability to neo-liberal accountability regimes. The former prioritised professional judgment and monitored performance through administrative hierarchies. The latter facilitate the holding to account of public service providers by clients, contractors and shareholders through market competition and consumer choice, tests of efficiency and 'value-for-money', performance standards and targets, and the need to ensure profitability. Stuart Ranson, 'Public Accountability in the Age of Neo-Liberal Governance', Journal of Education Policy 18, no. 5 (2003): 459–80, 463. 3Phillip Blond, 'The Rise of the Red Tories', Prospect 155 (2009): 32–6. 4Nikolas Rose, Powers of Freedom: Reframing Political Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999). 5Peter Kerr, Christopher Byrne, and Emma Foster, 'Theorising Cameronism', Political Studies Review 9, no. 2 (2011): 193–207. 6Ibid., 195. 7Stuart McAnulla, 'Heirs to Blair's Third Way? David Cameron's Triangulating Conservatism', British Politics 5, no. 3 (2010): 286–314. There are, of course, also important differences between New Labour and Cameronism, particularly with regard to the role of the state as we discuss below. 8Stuart Hall, 'Will Life After Blair Be Different?', British Politics 2, no. 1 (2007): 118–22; Richard Heffernan, 'Labour's New Labour Legacy: Politics After Blair and Brown', Political Studies Review 9, no. 2 (2011): 163–77. 9Peter Kerr, 'Cameron Chameleon and the Current State of Britain's "Consensus"', Parliamentary Affairs 60, no. 1 (2007): 46–65, 50. 10Phillip Blond is a communitarian intellectual known for his argument for Red Toryism. He has influenced policy thinking within the Conservative Party and now heads the public policy think-tank, ResPublica. Oliver Letwin is currently a Conservative Member of Parliament and Minister of State at the Cabinet Office. He has an academic background in policy studies and has been influential in the development of Conservative Party policy during Cameron's leadership. 11Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 149. 12Kevin Rudd, 'Social Democracy and the Global Financial Crisis', in Goodbye to all That? On the Failure of Neoliberalism and the Urgency of Change, ed. Robert Manne and David McKnight (Melbourne: Black Inc. Publishing, 2010), 73–98. This essay was originally published in The Monthly magazine in February 2009. 13Fazal Rizvi and Bob Lingard, Globalizing Education Policy (London and New York: Routledge, 2010); Bob Lingard, 'Policy Borrowing, Policy Learning: Testing Times in Australian Schooling', Critical Studies in Education 51, no. 2 (2010), 73–98: 120–47. 14Rudd, 'Global Financial Crisis', 74. 15Ibid., 97. 16Rizvi and Lingard, Globalizing Education Policy. 17Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 150. 18Ibid., 150. 19Jean-Francois Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1984), 150. 20McAnulla, 'Cameron's Triangulating Conservatism'. 21Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 150. 22Hall, 'Life After Blair', 120. 23Zaki Laidi, A World without Meaning: The Crisis of Meaning in International Politics (London: Routledge, 1998), 7. 24Heffernan, 'Labour's New Labour Legacy'; Kerr et al., 'Theorising Cameronism'; McAnulla, 'Cameron's Triangulating Conservatism'. 25Stephen Evans, '"Mother's Boy": David Cameron and Margaret Thatcher', The British Journal of Politics and International Relations 12, no. 3 (2010): 325–43. 26Kerr, 'Cameron Chameleon'. 27David Cameron, 'Our "Big Society" Plan' (speech, 31 March), http://www.conservatives.com/News/Speeches/2010/03/David_Cameron_Our_Big_Society_plan.aspx (accessed July 29, 2011). 28Peter Dorey, 'A New Direction or Another False Dawn? David Cameron and the Crisis of British Conservatism', British Politics 2, no. 1 (2007): 137–66. 29Kerr et al., 'Theorising Cameronism'. 36Ibid. 30McAnulla, 'Cameron's Triangulating Conservatism'. 31Evans, 'Mother's Boy'. 32Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 163. 33Blond, 'Red Tories', 35. 34McAnulla, 'Cameron's Triangulating Conservatism', 290–1. 35Cameron, 'Our "Big Society" Plan'. 37Kerr et al., 'Theorising Cameronism', 193. 38Ibid., 196. 39On triangulating politics see McAnulla, 'Cameron's Triangulating Politics'; on depoliticisation see Peter Burnham, 'New Labour and the Politics of Depoliticisation', British Journal of Politics and International Relations 3, no. 2 (2001): 127–49; Kerr et al. 'Theorising Cameronism'. 40McAnulla, 'Cameron's Triangulating Politics', 292. 41Kerr et al., 'Theorising Cameronism', 200. 42Michael Power, The Audit Society: Rituals of Verification (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997). 43Ranson, 'Public Accountability', 476; Cabinet Office, Open Public Services White Paper (Norwich: The Stationery Office Limited, 2011). 44Kerr et al., 'Theorising Cameronism', 198. 47Ibid., 109. 45Sonia Exley and Stephen J. Ball, 'Something Old, Something New: Understanding Conservative Education Policy', in The Conservative Party and Social Policy, ed. Hugh Bochel (Bristol: The Policy Press, 2011), 97–118. 46Ibid., 100. 48Walter Kickert, 'Steering at a Distance: A New Paradigm of Public Governance in Dutch Higher Education', Governance 8, no. 1 (1995): 135–57. 49Bernard Barker, 'Can Schools Change Society?', Forum 53, no. 1 (2011): 163–72. 50Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better (London: Allen Lane, 2009); Dennis J. Condron, 'Egalitarianism and Educational Excellence: Compatible Goals for Affluent Societies?', Educational Researcher 40, no. 2 (2011): 47–55. 51Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 5–6. 52Daniel Frandji and Sally Power, 'Education Markets, the New Politics of Recognition and the Increasing Fatalism Towards Inequality', Journal of Education Policy 25, no. 3 (2010): 385–96. 53Wilkinson and Pickett, The Spirit Level; OECD, Growing Unequal? Income Distribution and Poverty in OECD Countries (Paris: OECD, 2011). 54Pierre Bourdieu and Jean-Claude Passeron, Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture (London: Sage, 1977); Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis, Schooling in Capitalist America: Education Reform and the Contradictions of Economic Life (New York: Basic Books, 1976). 55Debra Hayes, Martin Mills, Pam Christie, and Bob Lingard, Teachers and Schooling Making a Difference: Productive Pedagogies, Assessment and Performance (Crows Nest, NSW: Allen & Unwin, 2006). 56Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 6. 57Wilkinson and Pickett, The Spirit Level. 58Condron, 'Egalitarianism and Educational Excellence'. 59Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 7. 60Power, The Audit Society. 61Ibid., chapter 3. 62Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 8. 63G. Stobart, Testing Times: The Uses and Abuses of Assessment (London: Routledge, 2008); Robin Alexander, ed., Children, Their World, Their Education: Final Report and Recommendations of the Cambridge Primary Review (London: Routledge, 2009). 64Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 9. 65Hayes et al., Teachers and Schooling; John Hattie, Visible Learning: A Synthesis of Over 800 Meta-Analyses Relating to Achievement (London: Routledge, 2009). 66James S. Coleman and others, Equality of Educational Opportunity Report (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1966); Wilkinson and Pickett, The Spirit Level. 67Condron, 'Egalitarianism and Educational Excellence'. 68Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 1. 69Pat Thomson, Schooling the Rustbelt Kids: Making the Difference in Changing Times (Crows Nest, NSW: Allen & Unwin, 2002). 70Luis Moll, Cathy Amanti, Deborah Neff, and Norma Gonzalez, 'Funds of Knowledge for Teaching: Using a Qualitative Approach to Connect Homes and Classrooms', Theory Into Practice 31, no. 2 (1992): 132–41; Norma Gonzalez, Luis Moll, and Cathy Amanti, eds., Funds of Knowledge: Theorizing Practices in Households, Communities and Classrooms (Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2005). 71Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 10. 72Pierre Bourdieu, Practical Reason: On the Theory of Action (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998). 73Peter Taubman, Teaching By Numbers: Deconstructing the Discourse of Standards and Accountability in Education (New York and London: Routledge, 2009). 74Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 162. 75Ibid., 172. 76Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 151. 80Ranson, 'Public Accountability', 473. 77Pasi Sahlberg, 'Rethinking Accountability in a Knowledge Society', Journal of Educational Change 11, no. 1 (2010): 45–61. 78Linda Darling-Hammond, The Flat World and Education: How America's Commitment to Equity Will Determine Our Future (New York: Teachers College Press, 2010). 79We are pursuing this matter in an Australian Research Council Linkage Project. Further identifying information has been removed at this stage to ensure anonymity. 81Stuart Ranson, 'Schools and Civil Society: Corporate or Community Governance', Critical Studies in Education 53, no. 1 (2012): 29–45. 82Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 158. 83Exley and Ball, 'Conservative Education Policy'. 84OECD, Growing Unequal? 85Barker, The Pendulum Swings, 158. 86Rudd, 'Global Financial Crisis'. 87Rizvi and Lingard, Globalizing Education Policy. 88Condron, 'Egalitarianism and Educational Excellence'. 89Arjun Appadurai, 'Grassroots Globalization and the Research Imagination', in Globalization, ed. Arjun Appadurai (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2001), 1–21.