The sixth algorithmic-infrastructural context: toward an epistemological extension of Stephen J. Ball’s policy cycle

Abstract

The policy cycle approach, developed by Bowe, Ball, and Gold (1992) and consolidated by Ball, Maguire, and Braun (2012), has become one of the most widely used frameworks in Ibero-American education policy research. Its formulation, however, rests on a political ecology that predates platformization, in which actors are identifiable human agents and technical infrastructure is treated as neutral. This theoretical-conceptual essay aims to propose and provide an epistemological rationale for including a sixth context—the algorithmic-infrastructural context—conceived as a cross-cutting layer running through the five canonical contexts, in which algorithms, platforms, and generative models engage in infrapolitical enactment below the threshold of democratic visibility. The hypothesis sustained is that, although the cycle retains its analytical robustness, it requires this explicit epistemological extension to account for the new sociotechnical ecology of education policy. Three traditions are articulated: the Ballian sociology of education policy, the algorithmic governmentality of Rouvroy and Berns (2013), and critical studies of education platformization. Three figure-types of infrapolitical enactment are derived—algorithmic curation, predictive assessment, and generative formatting—each yielding empirically falsifiable predictions. The essay concludes by upholding the epistemological and political urgency of rendering algorithmic infrastructure analyzable as a political actor in defense of teacher pedagogical sovereignty in Ibero-American educational systems increasingly captured by global platforms.

Keywords: Policy cycle. Algorithmic governmentality. Platformization of education.