The major aim of recent school education reform in China is to improve educational equity and quality. This paper aims to explore a collaborative reform in a school district in Hangzhou in Zhejiang Province. The major focus of the reform has been a change of school management from "government" to "governance," which is a shift…

While universities now lie between two philosophical poles -- idealism and utilitarianism -- the Humboldtian ideal primarily serves to give a humanist glaze to a technocratic discourse. Regardless of its autonomy on paper, the University does not control its finances. This guise of autonomy has set a double authoritarian heteronomy of the…

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has unveiled plans to move into the field of early childhood education through the introduction of the International Early Learning Study (IELS), a new comparative test of five-year olds that is being piloted in three nations. This article explores the dynamics of this new project…

This paper problematizes the dichotomy between neo-liberalism and socialism and the tendency to view the post-socialist condition as a process of convergence with 'Western' and 'global'. It does so by analysing the development and implementation of a quality assurance and evaluation (QAE) policy in school education in the context of the Russian…

For those who focus on the role of education in international development, the approach to education governance of school-based management (SBM) has been the primary means by which the participation of community members has been incorporated into the provision of education. However, while SBM is a well-known approach to governance that has become…

In this article, we provide a critical explanation and critique of neoliberalism. We attempt an innovative focus ranging from the wider contemporary political and ideological shifts, to the way in which neoliberal policy specifically influences higher education and the consequences thereof. We follow a narrative logic in three parts where we first…

This article is based on an interview conducted with Mark Olssen in October 2014, and the subsequent discussions. These conversations invited Olssen to reflect on his experiences of neoliberalism as a practising academic who has worked in the UK for some 14 years, and also to comment as a researcher and writer who is well known for his work on…

The European Union--comprising 28 member states with individual sovereignty in the formation and implementation of education policy--has developed research and communication strategies to facilitate the exchange of best practices, gathering and dissemination of education statistics and, perhaps most importantly, advice and support for national…