This article considers some theoretical resources for resistance to neoliberalised schooling and develops principles for reimagining the common school. Whilst relevant internationally, it is situated in the particular context of England, as a global epicentre of school reform -- a marketised and largely privatised system where the net of…

The essay examines the state of the American Educational Studies Association and Social Foundations of Education through the lenses of auto-ethnography and critical reflection. A discussion of the relevance of the AESA and social foundations in the context of transformative education for scholars from marginalized communities is central to the…

In this paper, we offer a critique of neoliberal power from the perspective of the gendered, sexualised, raced and classed politics of motherhood in English universities. By using dialogical auto-ethnographic methods to examine our own past experiences as full-time employed mother-academics, we demonstrate how feminist academic praxis can not only…

This lecture argues that the politicisation and instrumentalisation of the university caused by neoliberal frames has as a result the depoliticisation of knowledge and of the academic as individual. This depoliticisation has turned academic freedom into a right to disengage not only from the political fight around these issues but also from the…

From the colonial colleges to the present-day flagship universities, the undergraduate general education curriculum has dramatically shifted from a single, faculty-prescribed, general program to a diverse array of elective, student-choice-driven, specialized programs of general studies. This transformation has also encouraged, if not established,…

This paper uses Deleuzoguattarian schizoanalysis to interrogate concepts of social justice in relation to the crisis of neo-liberal capitalism by referring to the work of the Situationist International movement, the posthuman philosophy of Giles Deleuze and Félix Guattari as well as Afrofuturism. Providing an array of new theoretical responses as…

Simply put, charter schools have not lived up to their advocates' promise of equity. Using examples of tangible civil rights gains of the twentieth century (e.g. "Brown v. Board," "Lau v. Nichols") and extending feminist theories of invisible labor to include the labor of democracy, the authors argue that the charter movement…

Across the United States, a counter-network of teacher activists is engaged in the development of grassroots organizing structures to advocate for social justice, resist the privatization of public education, and increase union democracy. The United Caucuses of Rank and File Educators (UCORE) is a national network of more than 20 union reform…

Drawing upon socio-ecological and critical educational theory, this article examines neoliberal educational reforms through a theoretical framework of "commons" and "enclosure." Neoliberal reforms should be regarded as enclosures because they seek to privatize education for profit accumulation, foreclosing the possibility of…

This paper poses methodological questions about the role and limits of Foucault's concept of governmentality in education research. Firstly, it argues for the utility of governmentality as a means of exploring questions of power regardless of domain or scale. Secondly, it explores the boundary between the tasks of formulating critique and…

There is a good deal of ongoing debate about the effects and impacts of globalisation. Many educational theorists (e.g., Meyer et al., 1997) have argued that there is a world systems model at work (see Wallerstein, 2004). And we would agree that a convergent global rhetoric for education has emerged in the neoliberal period. However, whilst at the…

This paper discusses employing queer theory (QT) and queer legal theory (QLT) for critical policy analysis as applied to education. In doing so, the authors will highlight how both QT and QLT can empower analyses to look beyond the identity politics of a particular time period or space and toward potential reforms in curriculum, pedagogy, and…

This paper traces developments across Stephen J. Ball's policy sociology in education "oeuvre" and considers their implications for doing research on education policy today. It begins with an account of his policy sociology trilogy from the 1990s, which outlined his conception of the policy cycle consisting of the contexts of influence,…

New Labour's extended schools initiative added to existing models of community schooling. The paper identifies the key principles behind extended schooling, making comparisons with historical models and contemporary trends in community education. Part one examines New Labour's use of extended schools to deliver their social policy agenda. Part two…

This article looks through the lens of the gendered politics of historical writing at the main forms and direction of scholarship on gender in "History of Education" since its publication. It discusses how social, women's, feminist and gender history has been treated in the journal and how developing approaches around the body, space,…