Alexander Means

Despite proliferating attention within the social sciences toward the sources and consequences of climate change and environmental crises, educational sociologists have been slow to confront ecological questions. this omission may seem surprising given the prominence of global perspectives within the field. however, we argue, such a focus is emblematic of the discipline’s sociocentrism and anthropocentrism. against such a reified sense of the field’s conceptual and analytic purview, this paper reads ecology into educational sociology, with the aim of theorizing a ‘geo-logic’ basis for future scholarship. if critical sociology of education is to maintain its relevance in the anthropocene, the discipline must attend to ecological problematics. Building on three recent contributions to socio-ecological thought, we explain the necessity of an ecological attunement in critical sociology of education. to serve this call, we offer a theoretical revision of key disciplinary commitments, clearing new pathways for educational sociologists to do this crucial work.

In its far-reaching impacts on global life, encroaching upon seemingly every aspect of social totality, the COVID-19 pandemic is an urgent topic for cultural studies. This article situates the pandemic within a historical conjuncture in which various post-neoliberal formations are being struggled over. These emergent formations will in turn be indelibly impacted by the pandemic’s social, cultural, and political economic dimensions. Key to this uncertain future is a phenomenon we call collective disorientation, a concept that is implicated in the emergence, experience, and effects of the pandemic, as well as the political prospects for surviving the cascading crises of the pandemic conjuncture. Though the pandemic is a historically disorienting force, the cultural studies tradition is remarkably well-equipped to contribute to collective struggles seeking loci for new articulations beyond the COVID- 19 conjuncture.

In this wide-ranging conversation, Michael Hardt reflects on recent
transformations within Empire. Several unique themes emerge concerning power and pedagogy as they intersect with subjectivity and global crisis. Drawing on the common in conjunction with the tradition of love in education uncovers a different path that attends to today’s real political, ecological, and social needs. Finally, a focus on collectivity points to a possible strategy—collective intellectuality—for educators to revise traditional notions of leadership to encourage more ethical, democratic, and sustainable futures. Yet, what this looks like in practice remains for us to imagine.

Journal of Education Policy: Advanced by powerful venture philanthropies, educational technology companies, and the US Department of Education, a growing movement to apply ‘big data’ through ‘learning analytics’ to create ‘personalized learning’ is currently underway in K-12 education in the United States. While scholars have offered various critiques of the corporate school reform agenda, the role of personalized learning technology in the corporatization of public education has not been extensively examined. Through a content analysis of US Department of Education reports, personalized learning advocacy white papers, and published research monographs, this paper details how big data and adaptive learning systems are functioning to redefine educational policy, teaching, and learning in ways that transfer educational decisions from public school classrooms and teachers to private corporate spaces and authorities. The analysis shows that all three types of documents position education within a reductive set of economic rationalities that emphasize human capital development, the expansion of data-driven instruction and decision-making, and a narrow conception of learning as the acquisition of discrete skills and behavior modification detached from broader social contexts and culturally relevant forms of knowledge and inquiry. The paper concludes by drawing out the contradictions inherent to personalized learning technology and corporatization of schooling. It argues that these contradictions necessitate a broad rethinking of the value and purpose of new educational technology.

This paper examines how transformations in political economy and digital technology point toward potential post-neoliberal futures. Outlining the contours of a crisis of neoliberal hegemony, the authors explore how technological developments have contributed to political economic dynamics of market failure and oligarchic capture, resulting in new forms of digital precarity. As evidence, the paper examines a specific post-neoliberal discourse called neoreactionism (NRx), which has developed out of the distinct culture of Silicon Valley. NRx represents a specific vision for resolving conflicts inherent to neoliberalism by intensifying oligarchic capture and the acceleration of technology. While NRx is a techno-authoritarian discourse that exists largely outside of mainstream academic discussions, it is indicative of how transformations in late capitalism are fueling the rise of anti- democratic consciousness and identification. In response, the authors conclude with suggestions for developing post-neoliberal approaches to educational studies that are able to challenge these troubling reactionary trends.

This special issue brings together scholars who are working on new aspects of the intersection and implications of globalization, privatization, and marginalization. While globalization's relationship to education has been of great interest to scholars (e.g., Dale, 1999; Green, 1997; Rizvi & Lingard, 2009; Steiner-Khamsi, 2004; Verger, Novelli, & Kosar-Altinyelken, 2018). While the relationship between globalization and various forms of privatization has received significant attention (e.g., Adamson, Astrand, & Darling-Hammond, 2016; Ball, 2009, 2012; Carnoy, 1999; Mohamed & Morris, 2019; Robertson, Mundy, Verger, & Menashy, 2012; Verger, Lubienski, & Steiner-Khamsi, 2016), we seek to extend scholarship in these areas by examining the current connections and continuing consequences of both globalization and privatization for marginalization in/through education, as well as the ways in which the latter (marginalization) creates opportunities for the former (globalization and privatization). Exploring the relationships among globalization, privatization, and marginalization is vitally important for scholars not only because they are related in multiple yet, we argue, insufficiently understood ways, but also because their relations have real consequences for education policy and practice and for the exacerbation of marginalization itself in and through education. As the introductory essay for the special issue, this article (a) presents a framework for understanding the connections among globalization, privatization, and marginalization in relation to education; (b) distills, visually presents, and expands upon the dialectical connections evident “in” and “through” the cases that make up the special issue; and (c) emphasizes a number of lessons for the globalization-privatization-marginalization nexus.

This is the PDF of the entire two-part special issue that was co-edited by myself and Alexander Means in the journal Education Policy Analysis Archives. The focus of the special issue is "Globalization, Privatization, Marginalization: Assessing Connections and Consequences in/through Education".

The introductory essay for the special issue goes beyond a brief description of each of the cases. This article (a) presents a framework for understanding the connections among globalization, privatization, and marginalization in relation to education; (b) distills, visually presents, and expands upon the dialectical connections evident “in” and “through” the cases that make up the special issue; and (c) emphasizes a number of lessons for the globalization-privatization-marginalization nexus.

The papers in this special issue are grouped into two clusters. This grouping reflects the fact that, while all the papers speak to the three core concepts of globalization, privatization, and marginalization, the papers typically place analytic emphasis on two of the three and then consider the implications of their findings for the third. The papers in the first cluster focus on the ways privatization is being advanced through the dynamics of globalization, and then consider the implications for—or the connections to—marginalization. For example, these papers examine how policymaking processes, the provision of refugee education, quasi-market reform politics, international large-scale assessments of student learning, and the work of international non-governmental organizations are all advanced by political and economic globalization in ways that not only open spaces for privatization but also exacerbate marginalization in various forms.

The papers in the second cluster, in contrast, take as their point of departure various forms of privatization, considering directly their consequences for marginalization. These essays are framed with, and then connect back to, the dynamics of globalization. The different forms of privatization discussed by these papers include charter schools, vouchers, neo-vouchers (i.e., tax credits), and private schools that serve low-income families. Although their analytic focus is not squarely trained on the causes of each kind of privatization, the articles do address the contextual factors and the forces of political-economic globalization that have led to, or have contributed to, the form of privatization under study.

In all, the articles report on research from the “Global North”, meaning the United States, Western European and Mediterranean countries (i.e. Portugal, Italy, Israel), and New Zealand, with other studies focusing on the “Global South”, meaning countries in Latin America (i.e., Argentina, Chile, Peru), Africa (Zambia), and Asia (with two papers focused on India). One paper focuses on refugee education generally and thus is not focused on a specific geographic context.

Importantly, the articles contained in this special issue include but go beyond a focus on low-income countries. High-income—“developed”—countries are not immune to the effects of globalization and privatization. It is crucial that we understand the ways that these phenomena manifest across different contexts, not least because, across contexts that may seem wildly different, globalization and privatization have similar effects and are the result of similar forces, though the details of how they play out may be distinct.

This project was developed over the course of the past two years or so. We thank the authors for their excellent contributions and the reviewers for their helpful feedback.

We hope this special issue makes a contribution. Please feel free to forward along to colleagues, students, etc.

Best,

Brent Edwards
Alex Means
University of Hawaii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Globalization, Privatization, Marginalization: Mapping and Assessing Connections and Consequences in/through Education

Authors: D. Brent Edwards Jr. and Alexander Means

Section 1: Privatization and Marginalization in/through Globalization

2. “Glocalisation” doctrine in the Israel public education system: A contextual analysis of a policy-making process

Authors: Dvir, Maxwell, & Yemini

3. Education governance and privatization in Portugal: Media attention on the public debate about public and private education

Authors: Fatima Antunes, Sofia Viseu

4. Private encroachment through crisis-making: The privatization of education for refugees

Author: Hang Minh Le

5. Marginalization in education systems: The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) and the failure discourse around the Italian education system

Authors: Goncalves de Freitas, Jacob, & Nozaki

6. “A Problem They Don’t Even Know Exists”: Inequality, Poverty, and Invisible Discourses in Teach First New Zealand

Authors: Oldham & Crawford-Garrett

Section 2: Globalization and Marginalization in/through Privatization

7. Education privatization in the United States: Increasing saturation and segregation

Author: Adamson & Galloway

8. Education markets and schools’ mechanisms of exclusion: The case of Chile

Author: Adrián Zancajo

9. Speaking cooperation, acting competition: Supply-side subsidies and private schools in socioeconomically disadvantaged contexts in Buenos Aires

Authors: Mauro Moschetti, Carolina Snaider

10. Educating on a budget: The subsistence model of low-fee private schooling in Peru

Authors: María Balarin, Clara Fontdevila, Paola Marius, & María Fernanda Rodríguez

11. Low-fee private schools, the State, and globalization: A market analysis within the political sociology of education and development

Authors: Edwards, Okitsu & Mwanza

12. Motivations to set up and manage low-fee private schools in India

Authors: Hannah Mond & Poorvaja Prakash

13. Children’s accounts of labelling and stigmatization in private schools in Delhi, India and the Right to Education Act

Authors: Michael LaFleur, Prachi Srivastava

Education Policy Analysis Archives (EPAA/AAPE) announces a call for papers for a special issue that brings together education scholars who are working on new aspects of the intersection and the implications of globalization, privatization, and marginalization. While globalization's relationship to education has been of great interest to scholars (Dale, 1999; Rizvi & Lingard, 2009; Verger, Novelli, & Kosar-Altinyelken, 2018), and while the relationship between globalization and various forms of privatization has received attention (Adamson, Astrand, & Darling-Hammond, 2016; Ball, 2012; Carnoy, 1999; Verger, Lubienski, & Steiner-Khamsi, 2016), we seek to extend scholarship in these areas by depicting the current connections and continuing consequences of both globalization and privatization for marginalization in/through education, as well as the ways in which the latter (marginalization) creates opportunities for the former (globalization and privatization). Exploring the relationships among globalization, privatization, and marginalization is vitally important for scholars not only because they are related in multiple yet, we argue, insufficiently understood ways, but also because their relations have real consequences for education policy and practice and for the exacerbation of marginalization itself in and through education. Thus, this special issue seeks papers based on recent research that address the contemporary and developing connections among globalization, privatization, and marginalization and their consequences for/through education.

What might a common education mean in the 21st century? In this unflinchingly imaginative volume, critical scholars and educational activists investigate the intricate ways that education has been pulled into a contest between the enclosure of global commons and radical visions of a common social future that breaks through the logics of privatization, ecological degradation, and dehumanizing social hierarchies. In its institutional and informal configurations alike, education has been been identified as perhaps the key stake in this struggle. Insisting on the urgency of an education that breaks free of the bonds of enclosure, the essays included in this volume weave together bright threads of radical thought into a vivid tapestry illustrating a critical framework for enacting a global educational commons.

Toward a New Common School Movement suggests that educational privatization and austerity are not simply bad policies but represent a broader redistribution of control over social life-that is, the enclosure of the global commons. This condition requires far more than a liberal defense of public schooling. It requires recovering elements of the radical progressive educational tradition while generating a new language of the common suitable to the unique challenges of the global era. Toward a New Common School Movement traces the history of struggles over public schooling in the United States and provides a set of ethical principles for enacting the commons in educational policy, finance, labor, curriculum, and pedagogy. Ultimately, it argues for global educational struggles in common for a just and sustainable future beyond the crises of neoliberalism and predatory capitalism.

Learning to Save the Future: Rethinking Education and Work in an Era of Digital Capitalism is a timely, well-researched, accessible and insightful critique of today’s prevailing commonsense assumption that education, markets and technology will solve the serious political, social and economic crises we face. Amidst widespread debate about the threat automation, data analytics, robotics, advanced computing power and the Internet of Things pose (as well as their emancipatory potential), Learning to Save the Future takes aim at the popular belief that a looming technological revolution entails we shift to a ‘21st century education’ to forge agile, critical, creative, resilient, digitally-savvy and entrepreneurial life-long learners whose soft-skills, knowledge and ability to continually upgrade themselves will enable them to create or contribute to sustainable opportunities for growing economic wealth.

Learning to Save the Future shows us why this thinking is not only wrong but harmful, particularly to those already most disadvantaged.

Ongoing structural changes to the global economy stemming from technological advances and a reconfiguration of economic production practices and relations, often gathered under the headings of neoliberalism, Post-Fordism and globalization, have heightened global competition. Placing a premium on the creation of ever-more innovative methods of creating, conserving and capturing the means to expand economic growth, the dominant response of developed governments and policymakers has been to call for the creation of an economy centred on knowledge, creativity, innovation and self-reliance. Alongside other educational initiatives (e.g. character education, vocational education, knowledge mobilization, ‘grit’ and increased standardized testing), entrepreneurship education (EE) and financial literacy education (FLE) comprise core features of this response and their value has only grown following the 2008 financial crisis.

This book chapter calls into question FLE and EE initiatives’ near-universal acclaim, arguing that these initiatives and their promotion in the media draw from and recreate a neoliberal “public pedagogy” – a term used by Henry Giroux (2004) to describe the educative character of cultural discourses and practices which play “a central role in producing narratives, metaphors, and images that exercise a powerful pedagogical force over how people think of themselves and their relationships to others” (pg. 62). Contrary to claims that these initiatives assist those who are most economically insecure, this chapter illustrates that FLE and EE initiatives and their media promotions support an ethics and freedom driven by a responsibility to capital that exacerbates their precarity. The chapter begins with an overview of the ethics and freedom explicated in prominent FLE and EE texts. This is followed by a critical, philosophical analysis of their ‘capitalized’ character using concepts and insights from Levinasian scholars as well as Marxist theory and critical pedagogy. The chapter concludes that a lack of adherence to FLE and EE initiatives’ neoliberal precepts is not the problem. Instead the problem is teaching the insecure to be resilient in the face of social abandonment and to reform themselves so they can take up the offers of precarious inclusion capital offers, a ‘capitalization’ of both ethics and freedom. Rather than follow EE and FLE advocates and accept the abandonment and forced reformation of others as necessary and even ‘ethical’, this chapter explicates why we must create and promote non-capitalized ethical and economic relations and educative practices.