Understanding Education and Economics

Key Debates and Critical Perspectives

Jessie A. Bustillos Morales, Sandra Abegglen, Jessie A. Bustillos Morales, Sandra Abegglen

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9780429665080
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Economía
• Subtopic: Economía comparada

Understanding Education and Economics explores the multiple ways in which the field of education and schooling has become closely aligned with economic imperatives and interests, and the impact of this on learning and teaching. In particular, the increasing influence of economic arguments, economic ideologies and government involvement in education have made apparent that there is a need to reflect and talk about economic influences and trends in education.

Drawing on the expertise of educationalists around the world, the book articulates key debates and theoretical perspectives which can give both students and staff across several courses within the study of education a framework for discussing and analysing how economics defines and shapes the nature and purposes of education. The chapters offer discussions and reflections on key issues, including:

• the historical developments that led to the creation of a formal education system in England and Wales;

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• the ways in which neoliberalism underpins education, including the coercion of education to serve economic needs;

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• the economics of the university as an institution.

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Addressing philosophical, sociological, historical, psychological and social issues in education and encouraging readers to pose questions about the nature of education, this book is a valuable resource for students and staff alike and will allow them to broaden perspectives on what education could be for, and what it should be for.

1Introduction

How can we make sense of the influence of economics in education?

Jessie A. Bustillos Morales and Sandra Abegglen

Background

The world of economics is very pervasive, and in recent years there have been many changes in the world of education and schooling which have increased the influence of economics in education. This book explores some of the ways in which the field of education and schooling has become closely aligned with economic imperatives and interests. Some of the most significant changes come with the decision that turns the school into a competitive institution that depends on results for survival. This competition has been enabled by the introduction of national testing and assessments, national and international league tables, and the alignment of education to employment demands (West and Bailey, 2013). This means that nowadays education is more than something we take pleasure in and do for our own development. It is also an economic activity.

This book builds on the editors’ interest and expertise in education. Discussion with colleagues and attendance at conferences have highlighted the pressuring demands on education, and degrees in education. In particular, the increasing influence of economic arguments, economic ideologies and government involvement in education have made apparent that there is a need to reflect and talk about economical influences and trends in education. Many staff members in education lack a background in economics. Similarly, students attending degrees in education are often not introduced to debates surrounding education from an economic perspective, and thus lack the knowledge to examine how education is intertwined with the needs of economic systems. The editors feel that it is timely to close this gap and to offer a book that engages and offers ways to explore critical debates around economics and how they take shape in education.

The editors have asked other educationists to join them in outlining and articulating their thoughts and their work on the topic. The final product, this book, articulates key debates and theoretical perspectives which can give both students and staff across several courses within the study of education a framework for discussing and analysing how economics impacts on the world of education. Furthermore, the book presents propositions of how aspects of economics are present within education and schooling, and how they may impact learning and teaching. These discussions are not only relevant within the study of education but also in a broader socio-political realm. We are all subject to market trends and demands and thus cannot escape the unforgiving pace of the different economic realities that dominate the world. Knowing more may empower us to act. As John Dewey, the famous American philosopher, psychologist and educator maintained, ‘We do not learn from experience … we learn from reflecting on experience’ (1933: 78).

Opening up education

Education is a very contested concept, with many competing views on what education is and what is supposed to be for; it is difficult to arrive at a definition (Carr, 2003). As a topic it provokes debate and discussions, and everyone has an opinion, sometimes a very strong opinion, on what education means and what its purpose ought to be. We all seem to know something about education and thus have something to say about education. This might be due to our ongoing participation in education: whether we choose to participate in education or whether we have to participate. For instance, as an individual you might have thought about attending university and you might have considered different courses before eventually making your final choice. However, if you have children and they are of school age, this is less of a choice, rather it is a compulsory activity. Everyone, at least in the Western context, needs to go to school or receive some sort of education, be this through home-schooling or tutoring. Either way, education is an essential part of everyday life, and in current times it is very difficult not to be involved in some sort of educational process, either directly through our own experience or through the lives of others.

Another important distinction to make is that within education there are historical tensions which contribute to its ambiguity. On the one hand, there are philosophical questions regarding education and its meaning, and on the other hand there are more practical questions regarding how, as a society, we see education happening. For instance, we easily equate education to schooling, education as only occurring in schools and other educational institutions, although this does not need to be so. We could think about education as a lifelong process or something that happens in stages depending on our life circumstances, and not just during the traditional school cycle. This chapter argues that there are consequences to how we see education; the very initial steps as to how we define education alter any possible interpretation. For example, if we accept that education can only happen in schools, everything else associated with education is transformed to match the interpretive framework of the school as a social institution. The main relationships are centred around the teachers and the students, the parents and the school, the school and the community. Knowledge emerges as needing to be organised and delivered in the form of a curriculum. Learning becomes something that is confined to the sphere of the school and is quantifiable or measurable through assessments. Students and teachers are quickly categorised as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ depending on their adherence to these dynamics. Education becomes subservient to the main characteristics of schooling as a social institution. Schools are seen as places where we must go to learn and acquire knowledge and qualifications which are useful for the future, even if the future is increasingly uncertain.

With regard to education, this book will provide you with ‘food for thought’, enticing you to open up your ideas about education, to think critically and beyond your own experience and look at education as a system, and not just what your experience might have been like. Whilst drawing on experience is very important to understand things more deeply, to think about education more critically, we need to do more than that. We need to try and take a step back so that we are able to reflect meaningfully. Education is ubiquitous in our lives; in order to think more critically about it we need to make the familiar strange and apply a more sociological understanding. It is very difficult to think critically about something that over many years we have learnt to accept unproblematically. Instead, this book invites you to develop what C.W. Mills (2000: 5) called a ‘sociological imagination’ within the context of education; a more reflective understanding which recognises the value of thinking about the intersections between personal biographies and history.

The sociological imagination shows us how what we regard as our experience can only be seen as part of a wider set of collective experiences. Pause for a moment and think briefly about your own educational experience. Was it a positive experience? Did you enjoy going to school? What kind of student were you? Would you call yourself an educated person? Why? The answers to these questions might ask that you think about your experience, but in the same way they are what they are because of the environment in which your education happened. For example, if your hairstyle clashes with the expected codes of conduct and behaviours set by your school, you immediately become a ‘problem student’ who does not comply with school policy. Some people might suggest that you change your hair in a way that conforms to the rules and regulations in your school, but the main issue, the need to conform, will not disappear as it arises from the environment in which you find yourself in. Simply, if the rules on hairstyles were not there, you would not be labelled a problem student at all. Recently, schools have been accused of passing unnecessary punishments to pupils because of hair and uniform transgressions, with some students becoming temporarily and permanently excluded, or put in isolation (Turner, 2018). We might ask questions around why students’ uniforms and hairstyles are so important in schools, that we are willing to disrupt a child’s education by sending them home if they do not abide by strict dress codes and rules.

Throughout this chapter and throughout the book the notion of education is presented as broad and wide-ranging, with some chapters posing critical questions about education as an extensive process beyond the school and others more focused on education in schools and other educational institutions. The aims of this chapter are to get you to think about education and to introduce a broader understanding of education, from only defining it through our personal experience, to considering how education is constantly influenced by societal changes, one of which includes the importance of maintaining an economic equilibrium or status quo. The chapter also provides a purposeful outline of the upcoming chapters, against the backdrop of economics as an added layer of understanding, a layer which is normally neglected when we think about education. Education, in present times, raises questions of cost, value for money, financial benefits and gains, investment, efforts to improve and secure certain outcomes, effectiveness and usefulness. The drive behind these factors is very often defined by what the economy demands at a particular time and within a particular economic system. These factors cannot be ignored and need to be addressed in order to understand how the purposes of education change with each wave of economic change.

This book is primarily written for students, teachers and academics who wish to learn more about education and how the pressing demands of the economy and economic processes seep into its nature and its purpose. Readers will be introduced to various critical stances on how economics co-opts educational processes and becomes a key driver for educational change. The book will use current examples, case studies and theories to explore and illustrate how the study of education could be diversified; that is if we are willing to engage with an analysis of education which encompasses the pressure from wider economic debates.

What is education?

As the key focus of this book is on education, it is important to outline what we mean by it. When trying to define education, the work of British philosopher R.S. Peters is important as he provides perhaps the most systematic framework for understanding education. As Peters’ view is very extensive, we will focus on the three criteria which he has formulated; for a full discussion, see Peters’ original works (1966; Peters, Woods and Dray, 1973). In his book Ethics and Education, Peters provides a ‘synthetic sketch’ (Beckett, 2011: 239) for the concept of education. Firstly, Peters places education above other important aspects of human learning; he purports education is something that ‘is worth-while to those who become committed to it’ (1966, 45). That means education is not something to ‘tick off’ and ‘pass through’ but something to be enjoyed. In other words, if the learner does not see any purpose or value in the things he or she learns, then, according to Peters, this activity is not worthwhile and thus cannot count as educational. Secondly, ‘education must involve knowledge and understanding and some kind of cognitive perspective, which are not inert’ (45). This means that education does not, and cannot, consist of the mere acquisition of knowledge and skills. What counts is the transformation that happens. It also implies that individual needs to look beyond their own nose, into other fields and areas; to become educated they need to be able to see the wider world. Thirdly, education ‘rules out some procedures of transmission, on the grounds that they lack willingness and voluntariness on the part of the learner’ (45). This implies that education is something people ‘opt in’ and thus the educational process and procedures need to be morally acceptable. This means, teachers cannot ‘force’ learners to participate in activities that cause harm. According to Peters, any process that does not satisfy these three criteria cannot be called education. Thus, Peters has argued against an instrumentalist view of education, one that sees education as a utilitarian tool to serve society, improve economic and industrial growth and, consequently, the contentment of the populace.

However, Peters is not the only one who has thought deeply about what we might mean by education. Education Studies, as a discipline, explores educational issues and practices by drawing upon a range of theories and methods (Dufour and Curtis, 2011; Whitty and Furlong, 2017). Theorists and researchers in this area might ask why we educate and how. This is underscored by the belief that there is a need to question the nature and purposes of education in order to engage in a discussion about what education is. As Bartlett and Burton (2016) state, you need to turn the subject on its head to think critically about it. This leads them to define education as something that is broader than schooling. They might argue that education is ‘… essential for human development for both individuals and societies and has the potential to empower, change lives, bring about greater opportunities and enrich those who experience it’ (Marshall, 2018: 1). Others go even a step further and argue that in order to accommodate the various ‘language-games’ and to utilise opportunities, we need definitions that are flexible and open-ended whilst yet being context-specific (Sewell and Newman, 2014).

Depending on the standpoint taken, we could say that people adopt a particular ideology. Ideologies refer to the system of beliefs and values that an individual or a group holds, although some argue that ideologies are something that we as subjects do. For example, Louis Althusser (1976) said that ideologies only exist because they are enacted and performed, and for Althusser education was the most effective institution to reproduce dominant ideology. Either way, it is undeniable that people have different ideas about what education is and what it should be for. Functionalists might argue that education is essential for the continuation of society (and the state) while Liberalists see education as something that offers opportunities for individuals while also teaching us to live together respectfully. It is important to be aware of these different ideological stances because they underpin our views and approaches. In recent years, our belief of what education is (and should be) has increasingly been shaped by economic needs and ideologies, the prevalence of neoliberal economics, and the importance of enabling a market which sees competition as the defining characteristics of human relations.

Education and economics

To explore how economic ideas have become embedded in understandings of education, this book presents a variety of perspectives which illuminate how economics insidiously defines the meaning and purpose of education and schooling. In the past we have argued that education as a subject and as a notion is always under some regime of fast-paced change. We have discussed elsewhere, through the notion of discourse (Foucault, 1987), how education is conceived of and appropriated for purposes other than the pure pursuit of knowledge, self-development or enlightenment (Bustillos and Abegglen, 2018). Discourses ‘governs the way that a topic can be meaningfully talked about and reasoned about. It also influences how ideas are put into practice and used to regulate the conduct of others’ (Hall, 1997: 44). This book has emerged from such thinking and such reflections. Chapter by chapter, new possibilities are explained to envisage how economics has imposed itself as the prism through which education, its purposes and nature are viewed. Some of the chapters in this book analyse historical and political contexts in which systems of education and schooling have emerged. Other chapters look at more recent events and provide explanations for how education is a plane marked by competition for funding, the deskilling of teachers, the view of students and families as customers, and education as a form of economic investment among others. In this book, the site of the school, perceptions of knowledge, the history of education and the experiences of students and teachers are used to point out and decode some of the discourses deriving from political and economic rhetoric which influence the world of education as a whole. Looking at these discourses is useful because they are a representative of the production of power and as such underscore developments in education both o...