Europeanizing Education: governing a new policy space

Non-affirmative Theory of Education as a Foundation for Curriculum Studies, Didaktik and Educational Leadership

“…Transnational institutions of different kinds have definitely challenged the nation-state perspective that has dominated curriculum research (Robertson 2006). The emergence of a 'European policy space' or the European Union as new 'transnational state' (Grek 2009;Lawn and Grek 2012) has naturally challenged the idea of the nation-state as the ultimate location for curriculum work or for any public policy making. Still, especially school leadership is mainly perceived as a 'within-state' dilemma (Clarke and Wildy 2009).…”

Quality of Education and Its Evaluation: An Analysis of the Russian Academic Discussion

“…Major works in education policy research have recently approached the topic of quality assurance and evaluation from two intertwined theoretical angles: as a tool of governance at a distance and as a manifestation and a means to introduce New Public Management reforms in education and other social spheres (Ferlie, Musselin, & Andresani, 2008;Hood, 1991;Lawn & Grek, 2012;Miller & Rose, 1990). Governing at a distance is understood here as a specific mode of governance or "governmentality" based on the idea of acting from a center on the habits, desires, and actions of the spatially, culturally or organizationally distant others (Miller & Rose's concept as described in Rose, O'Malley, & Valverde, 2006, pp.…”

“…Governing at a distance is capable of imposing the logic of the center over scattered and diverse places and producing a common "disciplining and enabling space" (Lawn & Grek, 2012, p. 82). It is this capacity to create cohesion and commonality amidst diversity that makes this mode of governance suitable for most complex political tasks such as "creating Europe," as powerfully described by Lawn and Grek (2012;also Nóvoa & Yariv-Mashal, 2003). There are several ways in which evaluation and quality assurance procedures contribute to governing at a distance.…”

Lost in Translation? A Case Study of Macao in Fabricating a European Education Space in Asia

“…This has ranged from the concerns of developing a common cultural identity to that of a harmonisation of systems, the formation of an educational space and new spaces of governance. In effect, scholars, such as Ozga, Lawn, Grek, and Nóvoa among others, are concerned about the ways in which the emergence of 'global governmentality', such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) or the discourse of lifelong learning advocated by Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), has produced a 'soft governance' in which large amounts of numerical data are used to standardise the European education policy space (Lawn, 2006(Lawn, , 2011Ozga et al, 2011;Lawn & Grek, 2012). Some have challenged the view that this global development, namely the educational performance data of PISA, could serve as the 'gold standard' in producing the global 'script' for national and regional contexts (Ozga, 2012, p.166).…”

“…The OMC is a 'soft tool', a 'soft law', a 'soft power', and a 'soft form of governance' (Lawn, 2006;Alexiadou, 2007;Rutkowski & Engel, 2010;Lawn & Grek, 2012), which creates the possibility of 'a new policy space' (Lawn & Grek, 2012), and contributes to the creation of a terrain of governance across Europe and possibly beyond. According to Dale (citied in Ozga et al, 2011, location 641), it was intended that the OMC would::…”