Policies that reconfigure schooling: policy networks and their effects on teachers’ work, curriculum and management in public education
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5212/PraxEduc.v.20.25039.042Abstract
This paper seeks to discuss the repercussions of the involvement of various actors in the construction of education policies on teachers’ work, curriculum, and school management. In order to do so, we begin with a theoretical discussion of the State as a social relation and the use of the strategic-relational approach to analyze the State and the mobilization of forces that constitute state power. We then examine the mobilization of different actors in education policy, primarily through the lens of New Public Management (or managerialism). Complementing this perspective, we use the notion of policy networks to understand the catalyzation of different actors for the treatment of public policies. We then use network ethnography as a methodology to find distinct actors who act in specific policies implemented in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, between 2021 and 2023, and their subsequent discussion and analysis in teacher’s work, curriculum, and management. The presence of these actors has led to dynamics of reskilling and deskilling, the growth of the conservative notion of official knowledge, and hybrid processes of centralization and decentralization in educational management. We conclude by advocating for a research agenda that uncovers policies, actors, and their discourses, in order to consolidate a counter-hegemonic agenda of resistance.
Keywords: Managerialism. Policy networks. Strategic-relational approach.
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