Manifestations of neoliberal discourses within a local job‐training program

Abstract

The purpose of conducting this study was to understand how neoliberal discourses manifest within the local context of a short-term, job-training program offered at a two-year college in the USA. Ethnographic data were collected at the local site through interviews, observations and document analysis. We then situated these data within a global context represented by a corpus of purposively selected national and international policy texts. Focusing on three components of discourse as social action-genres, representations and identities-the data analysis illuminated three interrelated themes relating to how institutional actors translated neoliberal discourses available at the global scale into practice. The ideological consequences for learners as well as examples of counter-hegemonic resistance are discussed. Article: MANIFESTATIONS OF NEOLIBERAL DISCOURSES WITHIN A LOCAL JOB-TRAINING PROGRAM A central feature of the current economic and social milieu is the ascendancy of neoliberalism, a political economic program in which individual property rights, deregulated markets and free trade are seen as fundamental to human well-being (Harvey 2005). Quite distinct from the Keynesian, mixed-market capitalism of the mid-twentieth century, the current political economic order has been referred to as the new capitalism (Fairclough 1995), and within this program cities, states, nations and regions compete fiercely to attract global capital as a means of advancing a certain variety of economic growth. Consequently, governments at various levels become preoccupied with advancing an institutional framework that establishes a favourable business climate, and goals of international economic competitiveness are assumed to serve the common good.

Community colleges and the politics of sociospatial scale

“…Related analyses have explored the spatiotemporal relations among policy texts in the implementation of the Bologna Declaration (Wodak and Fairclough 2010); university-level education and the knowledge-based economy in Europe (Jessop et al 2008); the marketization of universities in the United Kingdom (Fairclough 1993); and the community college as a component of the state's neoliberal institutional framework (Ayers 2005;Ayers and Carlone 2007). All of these studies were informed by critical discourse analysis and cultural political economy as interdisciplinary approaches to social research.…”

“…It naturalizes and legitimizes capital disinvestment if localities fail to adopt ''businessfriendly'' competitive policies, which usually entail incentives such as tax breaks and state-sponsored job training. Within this milieu, working class communities-led by local growth coalitions-compete with one another to attract external investment and eagerly subordinate community, family, and individual needs to the demands and interests of capital (Ayers and Carlone 2007;Ayers et al 2008). Swyngedouw (1997) associates rescaling, specifically the collapse of Atlantic Fordism and the subsequent rise of the post-Fordist regime of accumulation, with four macro-social outcomes.…”

Security, Dignity, Caring Relationships, and Meaningful Work

“…Accompanying this rescaling of economic risks is a discourse of lifelong learning in which unemployment is not a failure of economic policy but an educational deficit of the unemployed (Ayers, 2005;Ayers & Carlone, 2007). As constructed by this discourse, economic activity at the global scale transcends regulation, the nation-state lacks the moral authority to influence markets, and local communities have no choice but to adapt to global demands (Peck, 2002;Uitermark, 2002).…”

“…This advice may be particularly salient for program planners in community colleges because (a) learners who come to the community college are often already disadvantaged (Levin, 2007) and (b) such disadvantage may be exploited either as an unintended consequence of structural inequality or even deliberately (Apple, 2004;Freire, 1970). Indeed, Ayers and Carlone (2007) observed a community-based program in which the interests of business, industry, and economic development agencies took precedence over the interests of individuals, families, and human services organizations.…”

“…Within a culture in which the competing interests of employers and learners are often obscured (Ayers, 2005;Ayers & Carlone, 2007), we encourage program planners in community colleges to engage in the politics of education (Cervero & Wilson, 2001) and to recognize learners as more than economic entities. The four themes that emerged in this study represent basic human needs.…”