This article illustrates how the British Council Bangladesh (BCB) made use of panel discussions and commissioned research as policy vehicles to persuade the government of Bangladesh of the value of social enterprises for public service delivery, including in education. Drawing upon Appadurai's notion of 'imagined worlds' in relation to influential…

In 2011, the Taiwanese Ministry of Education issued a policy on the internationalisation of schooling. The policy assumes that being 'international' has become necessary in order to maintain economic competitiveness in a globalising world. It was published in two languages: Mandarin, the official language in Taiwan, and English, presupposed as a…

The argument of this paper is that new methodologies associated with the emerging field of "policy mobilities" can be applied, and are in fact required, to examine and research the networked and relational, or "topological", nature of globalised education policy, which cuts across the new spaces of policymaking and new modes of…

This paper traces the complexities, contingencies and tensions involved in the creation of a new, 'scientific' assessment in what we call Prefecture A in Japan. We start with a thick, granular description of the complicated and ongoing narrative of a new policy emergence. This descriptive account serves as a precursor to our application of an…

This article presents a policy sociology reflection on Bernard Barker's book, "The Pendulum Swings: Transforming School Reform". The book represents Barker's attempt to intervene in education policy during the lead-up to the 2010 UK general election and is framed by what he imagined might be possible under a new Conservative government.…

Governing processes in Europe and within Europeanization are often opaque and appearances can deceive. The normative practices of improvement in education, and the connected growth in performance measurement, have been largely understood in their own terms. However, the management of flows of information through quality assurance can be examined…

This paper is concerned to demonstrate the usefulness of the theory of Bourdieu, including the concepts of field, logics of practice and habitus, to understanding relationships between media and policy, what Fairclough has called the 'mediatization' of policy. Specifically, the paper draws upon Bourdieu's accessible account of the journalistic…

Introduces a collection of essays that examine the notions of globalization from the perspective of educational theory and explore the ways in which the discourses, practices, and institutions of education have been affected by globalization and the ways in which educational policies have both expressed and responded to the pressures of…

Drawing on interviews and documents, the changing forms of the Australian national education agenda, as developed by the Australian Education Council, are examined. Discussion focuses on four areas: (1) national curriculum statements, schooling profiles, and competency statements; (2) the training reform agenda; (3) higher education; and (4) the…

The impact on higher education equity and diversity of Australia's recent shift from elite to mass higher education is assessed. Among the issues discussed are institutional role and autonomy, changes in regulation, market forces in higher education, and competition among institutions. (MSE)