Roger Dale

Globalisation, knowledge economy and comparative education

This paper seeks to introduce this special issue by setting out what seem to be some of the major theoretical and methodological issues raised for comparative education by the increasing prominence of the discourses of the knowledge economy, which, it is argued, represent a particularly strong version of globalisation and its possible relationships to education systems, and hence an especially acute challenge to comparative education. It focuses on the possible implications of these changes for each of the three elements of ‘national education system’. In terms of the ‘national’ it discusses the nature and consequences of methodological nationalism, and emphasises the emerging pluri‐scalar nature of the governance of education. In terms of ‘education’, it argues that education is now being asked to do different things in different ways, rather than the same things in different ways. In terms of ‘system’, it is suggested that the constitution of education sectors may be in the process of changing, with a development of parallel sectors at different scales with different responsibilities. Overall, the article suggests that we may be witnessing the development of a new functional, scalar and sectoral (non zero sum) division of the labour of educational governance. Finally, it addresses the question ‘what is now to be compared’ and considers the consequences for both ‘explaining’ and ‘learning’ through comparative education.

GATS and the Education Service Industry: The Politics of Scale and Global Reterritorialization

One consequence of the hype around globalization and education and debates on global political actors such as the World Bank, IMF and WTO—is that there has not been sufficient attention paid by education theorists to the development of a rigorous set of analytic categories that might enable us to make sense of the profound changes which now characterize education in the new millennium. 1 This is not a problema confined to education. Writing in the New Left Review, Fredric Jameson observes that debates on globalization have tended to be shaped by “…ideological appropriations— discussions not of the process itself, but of its effects, good or bad: judgements, in other words, totalizing in nature; while functional descriptions tend to isolate particular elements without relating them to each other.” In this paper we start from the position that little or nothing can be explained in terms of the causal powers of globalization; rather we shall be suggesting that globalization is the outcome of processes that involve real actors—economic and political—with real interests. Following Martin Shaw, we also take the view that globalization does not undermine the state but includes the transformation of state forms; “…it is both predicated on and produces such transformations.”3 Examining how these processes of transformation work, however, requires systematic investigation into the organization and strategies of particular actors whose horizons or effects might be described as global.

Local States of Emergency: The contradictions of neo-liberal governance in education in New Zealand

In the present paper, we argue that neo-liberal governance regimes are deeply contradictory and that these contradictions are increasingly evident within the education sector. Drawing on a case study of the consequences of restructuring in education in New Zealand, arguably a paradigm case of neo-liberal governance, we suggest the state is faced with a dilemma about how best to manage these tensions and contradictions within the framework of the political rationality itself. One strategy is to isolate and localise these problems in order to contain and manage the risks associated with them. We identify five variants we argue can broadly be viewed as local states of emergency.

The social justice implications of privatisation in education governance frameworks: a relational account

This paper explores the social justice implications of two, ‘linked’, governance developments which have been instrumental in reshaping many education systems throughout the world: the ‘privatising’ and ‘globalising’ of education (Klees, Stromquist, & Samoff, 2012). We argue that such education governance innovations demand an explicit engagement with social justice theories, both in themselves, and as offering an opportunity to address issues of social justice that go beyond the re/distribution of education inputs and outputs, important though these are, and which take account of the political and accountability issues raised by globalising of education governance activity. To do this we draw upon Iris Marion Young’s concept of ‘the basic structure’ and her ‘social connection model’ of responsibility (Young, 2006a,b) to develop a relational account of justice in education governance frameworks.

Beyond Methodological ‘ISMS’ in Comparative Education in an Era of Globalisation

Gavin Smith’s pithy insight takes us straight to the heart of the methodological – but also the substantive – problems posed to comparative education by ‘globalisation’. We do not need to defi ne globalisation very precisely to recognise that it has brought about major challenges to comparative education’s objects of study, and the terms and concepts it uses – and this means, we will argue, that it has also brought about changes in the meaning of comparative education itself. In this chapter we will be suggesting that recognising the nature and extent of this problem is one of the most important requirements of being comparative in education in an era of globalisation, for a major consequence of globalisation, not just for comparative education but more generally, is that while it has profound effects on the key features of the economic political and social worlds we inhabit, we remain tied to the concepts with which we described and understood the world prior to globalisation. We will focus here on both the changes brought about by globalisation in the core objects of study of comparative education, ‘national’ ‘education’ ‘systems’ and their consequences for the area of study, both methodological and ‘political’. In terms of the fi rst, we will suggest that the three central elements of the fi eld of comparative education, respectively directly related to those three core objects of study, are in danger of becoming somewhat ossifi ed and of thereby restricting, or even obstructing, rather than expanding, our opportunities to come to terms with globalisation and the ways in which institutional and everyday life has been transformed. We will suggest that the danger can be summed up by suggesting that the ways of approaching the central elements of comparative studies of education, national systems, state-run, of education, are in severe danger of becoming ‘isms’. We may be confronted by, or reliant on, not just methodological nationalism, but methodological statism and methodological educationism. In each case the ‘ism’ is used to suggest

Towards a ‘critical cultural political economy’ account of the globalising of education

This paper outlines the basis of an alternative theoretical approach to the study of the globalisation of ‘education’ – a Critical, Cultural Political Economy of Education (CCPEE) approach. Our purpose here is to bring this body of concepts – critical, cultural, political, economy – into our interrogation of globalising projects and processes within what we will refer to as the ‘education ensemble’ as the topic of enquiry, whose authoritative, allocative, ideational and feeling structures, properties and practices, emerge from and play into global economic, political and cultural processes In the first half of the paper we introduce and develop the concepts that will underpin our approach. In the second half of the paper we explore the explanatory potential and epistemic gain of a CCPEE approach by examining the different manifestations of the relationship between globalisation as a political, cultural and economic project and an education ensemble. We conclude by reflecting on the possibilities this perspective offers.

Changing Meanings of "The Europe of Knowledge" and "Modernizing the University," from Bologna to the "New Lisbon".

No European country is large enough or strong enough to step into the knowledge era by itself. Given the scale of operations of our global competitors, it is not logical or efficient for any individual EU member to go it alone. The challenge is global; the response has to be European. Only if Europe plays as a team will we regain the lead in the world knowledge league…. Of course, it is important to uphold the principle of subsidiarity: education and research policies are, and will remain, mainly national responsibilities. However, you will agree that there is a lot we can do together. Education, research, and the drive toward innovation are textbook cases in which the European whole is larger than the sum of its national parts. The most compelling example is the drive to establish genuine European areas in higher education, research, and innovation. (Barroso 2007)

From comparison to translation: extending the research imagination?

This paper addresses Appadurais challenge to expand the research imagination. It follows Boaventura de Sousa Santos in suggesting a need to separate analytically the trajectories of capitalism and modernity. For Santos, this involves the recognition that we cannot solve the problems of postmodernity with the tools of modernity. The paper approaches this problem through a focus on the idea of comparison as a high point of modern social science. It outlines five critiques of the ways that comparison has been used that both assume and reinforce the assumptions of modernity: that comparison is not the only way that relations between states can be elaborated; that cases and variables should not be wrested from their wider contexts; that assumptions of the predominance of the national level, especially as the basis for comparative indicators, are misleading; that the acceptance of a common set of measures constructs silences in the world outside the West; and that it does not ask whose knowledges are being recognised. The paper proposes four possible forms of moving comparison towards what Santos calls ‘translation’—‘expanding mutual intelligibility without destroying the identity of the partners of translation’; a critical theory that recognises that silences are constructed; distinguishing between rules of recognition and rules of realisation; constructing a level at which different concepts may be made commensurable; and creating a set of ‘education questions’ as a ‘contact zone where different conceptions may meet to construct reciprocal intelligibility and expand the research imagination.

The social condition of higher education: globalisation and (beyond) regionalisation in Latin America

This article aims to discuss the relationship between higher education (HE), globalisation and regionalism projects focusing on HE in Latin America and Brazil. It is claimed that HE has predominantly taken the diverse, yet concerted and co-ordinated routes of globalisation and regionalisation and, by doing so, been profoundly transformed. The first section considers a set of theoretical categories in relation to the phenomena of globalisation and regionalisation. The second section analyses the global and regional dimensions of HE in Latin America, exploring: (1) the Common Market of the South (MERCOSUR), along with the processes and mechanisms put into place to settle MERCOSURs Educative Sector. It is argued that despite the political relevance of this regional project, its major developments are still harbouring important but preliminary preparations for future regional positioning and empowerment; (2) it is argued that the commodification, privatisation and ‘marketisation’ of HE, having occupied the centre stage in determined nations of the world, have become the founding conditions of a global market in HE; and (3) the Brazilian HE policies are examined in order to develop an argument about the decisive role played by national government in promoting and adjusting the process of globalisation and the regionalism project for HE.

Employability and mobility in the valorisation of higher education qualifications : the experiences and reflections of Chinese students and graduates

ABSTRACT In the last two decades, we have witnessed a rapid expansion of higher education in Mainland China and Taiwan, recording a significant increase in higher education enrolments in these two Chinese societies. The massification of higher education in China and Taiwan has inevitably resulted in an oversupply of university graduates, with growing social concerns for skills mismatches being found in the labour market, stagnant graduate employment and social mobility. This article critically examines how university students and graduates in these two Chinese societies reflect upon their employment experiences. Human capital theory predicts that other things being equal, raising participation in higher education will initially increase inequality as rates of return rise, and then it will reduce inequality as expansion reaches mass levels and rates of return decline. If the output of graduates outpaces the demand for their skills, which appears to be the current case in many countries, then supply and demand pressures reduce the pay premium for degrees and lower income inequalities. However, this study clearly demonstrates that the massification and the universalisation of higher education in Mainland China and Taiwan, respectively, have actually intensified inequality.