In the course of a study on the impacts of changing early childhood policy in Aotearoa New Zealand since 1989, the illustrations accompanying three major government reports and policies stood out as encapsulating the changes in underlying discourses. This enabled the illustrations from these three policy reports to be used for a historical…

This paper takes a post-structural approach, examining what and how issues are framed in the parenting policy, "Incredible Years," through Foucault's (1977, 1980, 1991, 2003, 2004) notion of "governmentality and discursive normalisation." By unpacking discourses of parenting produced by Incredible Years as an accepted parenting…

This article argues that a focus on human capability and its development can be used to rethink the high skills policy visions favoured over recent decades. The article briefly summarises the increasing concerns with government policy formulas which have adopted a narrow focus such that skill and its accreditation is regarded as the outcome rather…

New Zealand has received world-wide accolades for its Early Childhood Education (ECE) curriculum, Te Whariki. This paper explores the tension between economic imperialism, and a curriculum acknowledged as visionary. The foundational ideas of Te Whariki emanate from sociocultural and anti-racist pedagogies. However, its implementation is hampered…

This article examines the effects of edu-capitalism and neoliberal education policies across Australia, New Zealand and United States to disrupt hegemonic policy logic based on neutral human capital. Current frameworks, standards and assessment tools govern and control how early childhood educators see and assess children and in turn develop and…

Following the Tomorrow's Schools administrative restructuring, a second wave of educational change installed globalised discourses as governmentality policies in Aotearoa New Zealand. Drawing on Foucault's "toolkit", this genealogical policy chronology traces the transformation of curriculum and assessment into a specific political…

This policy chronology traces the institution of globalised school curriculum and assessment discourses, as a vernacular and specific form of public rationalisation and educational governmentality in Aotearoa New Zealand. Without functional national standards or national testing, official discourses constructed an assessment-driven framework as a…

This paper presents a comparative discourse analysis of the learning support policy in New South Wales, Australia and New Zealand. The dominant discourses in both policies are identified and analysed in terms of how they determine the manner in which students experiencing difficulties with learning are included in schools. It is argued that the…

This article offers a critical analysis of recent trends in educational policy with particular reference to their assumptions about the knowledge society. It examines the implications of the analysis for the issue of elitism and the promotion of greater educational equality. The article concludes by offering an alternative approach to educational…

The Programme for International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) will establish technical standards and guidelines to ensure that the survey design and implementation processes of PIAAC yield high-quality and internationally comparable data. This document provides a revised version of the technical standards and guidelines originally…

The contribution of higher education institutions to regional development is a theme that has attracted growing attention in recent years. Knowledge institutions are increasingly expected not only to conduct education and research, but also to play an active role in the economic, social and cultural development of their regions. The extent to…

Perpetual training is the new rationale for education and training in advanced industrial countries, providing the link between education and the economic system. This paper is concerned with Skill New Zealand, a "seamless" education system integrating all education levels with workplace training. The paper examines this new program's…

The labour market is one the most significant markets in modern economies. Today labour embodies increasing amounts of human capital in the form of skills, talents and knowledge. Migration of workers between regions and countries can contribute to efficiency. People are moving from areas in which they are underemployed or unemployed to areas in…

This paper addresses the educational implications of the geopolitical changes arising from the associated processes of globalisation and regionalisation for the small island states of the South Pacific. As an educationist whose research field combines analysis of the New Zealand educational reforms undertaken over the last decade within a wider…

This book examines 1980s educational reforms and their consequences for the 1990s, focusing on the Australian Labor Party government's policy response to conditions of economic scarcity. The first section addresses the broader economic, social, political, and ideological context of educational reform under Australian Labor governments, compared to…