Abstract:
Educational restructuring has assumed particular global features: tightening the steering capacity of the state in linking education to the economy through policy, reduced educational expenditure, the privatisation of educational costs and marketisation of education, the devolution of management and the restructuring of educational work for administrators and teachers. The arguments presented for these trends are that we need new forms of education for post modern times.
Educational institutions are now to becoming more self managing in terms of prioritising funds, use of human resources and meeting individual client needs , and, through the mechanism of the market, to deliver quality services in education more efficiently. We are seeing a shift, therefore, in the relationship therefore between the individual and the state in the eductation sector, as well as between these self managing institutions and community, characterised by Anna Yeatman as a shift from a welfare to a contractualist state.
I have argued elsewhere that the conjuncture of the marketisaton of education and self management has produced a fundamental shift in the social relationships of educational work which has significant effect on curriculum and pedagogy in schools, technical and further education, adult education and universities (Blackmore,1994a&b) The fundamental shift of social relationships is best understood as moving out of a service oriented relationship towards a form of contractualism between individuals, between institutions, between the state and individuals / institutions. As with all marketisation, desire is central to this process. There has been simultaneously a privatisation and commodification of personal and professional desires, in that the ways in which individuals professional and personal desires are captured and incorporated into organisational outcomes. ( Hargreaves, 1995; Blackmore, 1994a & b; Kerfoot& Knights, 1993).
The notion of self governance is indeed seductive. Women with child care responsbilities seek flexibility. But it is also highly dangerous territory for women! In this feminist perspective on the conjuncture of marketisation and self governance and its associated discourses of devolution, downsizing, outsourcing, flexibility and skilling to consider what are the material effects of such discourses on the everday lives of women educators and their work in curriculum and pedagogy? In developing a critique I will draw upon an emerging literature on feminist economics and how it would shift attention away from bi-polarity between scarcity/ redistribution; maximising rewards /well being;selfishness/ altruism ( Strober, 1994; Pujol, 1993 etc). I will undertake the deconstructive work by providing instances out of recent research projects in schools, TAFE, ALBE and universities. While each site has temporal /spatial particularity, I will suggest patterns and trends and possible scenarios. Finally, I will propose some possibilities / dangers for the feminist project of this particular historical discontinuity.
Educational institutions are now to becoming more self managing in terms of prioritising funds, use of human resources and meeting individual client needs , and, through the mechanism of the market, to deliver quality services in education more efficiently. We are seeing a shift, therefore, in the relationship therefore between the individual and the state in the eductation sector, as well as between these self managing institutions and community, characterised by Anna Yeatman as a shift from a welfare to a contractualist state.
I have argued elsewhere that the conjuncture of the marketisaton of education and self management has produced a fundamental shift in the social relationships of educational work which has significant effect on curriculum and pedagogy in schools, technical and further education, adult education and universities (Blackmore,1994a&b) The fundamental shift of social relationships is best understood as moving out of a service oriented relationship towards a form of contractualism between individuals, between institutions, between the state and individuals / institutions. As with all marketisation, desire is central to this process. There has been simultaneously a privatisation and commodification of personal and professional desires, in that the ways in which individuals professional and personal desires are captured and incorporated into organisational outcomes. ( Hargreaves, 1995; Blackmore, 1994a & b; Kerfoot& Knights, 1993).
The notion of self governance is indeed seductive. Women with child care responsbilities seek flexibility. But it is also highly dangerous territory for women! In this feminist perspective on the conjuncture of marketisation and self governance and its associated discourses of devolution, downsizing, outsourcing, flexibility and skilling to consider what are the material effects of such discourses on the everday lives of women educators and their work in curriculum and pedagogy? In developing a critique I will draw upon an emerging literature on feminist economics and how it would shift attention away from bi-polarity between scarcity/ redistribution; maximising rewards /well being;selfishness/ altruism ( Strober, 1994; Pujol, 1993 etc). I will undertake the deconstructive work by providing instances out of recent research projects in schools, TAFE, ALBE and universities. While each site has temporal /spatial particularity, I will suggest patterns and trends and possible scenarios. Finally, I will propose some possibilities / dangers for the feminist project of this particular historical discontinuity.