Skolutveckling som diskursiv praktik. Några ideologiska implikationer

A significant part of educational science rhetoric emphasizes that the world has undergone profound changes. Talk of globalization the discourse of globalization – claims that various phenomena are now interconnected and that this results in a variety of underlying tensions that simply must be dealt with. Radical transformations in the education system and the labour market are associated to globalization, as if there were an unquestionable, essential, causal link between this and that in that particular case (Angus, 2004; Wilding, 1997). Formal training is focused, and made into some sort of salvation and something that must be prioritized. Some scientists call it The Education Gospel (Grubb & Lazerson, 2006). Both to the discourse of globalization and The Education Gospel , it is possible to link multiple discursive manifestations like partnership, collaboration, participation and ’lifelong learning’, all of which have great impact in various policy documents at both a national and an international level. These manifestations are launched as strategies for coping with the many assumed challenges of globalization and in the motley crew of these imperatives, described above, the talk concerning school development is a typical feature. School development is a frequently used word in Sweden and has been so during at least the previous 15 years. The concept is given a prominent position in a number of texts, more often in educational contexts. It is no overstatement to speak of school development as a branch. There are, says Foucault (1977/2003), reasons to respond skeptically, especially for arrangements or rituals of power marked by freedom and possibility claims so called self-discipline e.g. such that make subjects feel empowered. Authoritarian tendencies and claims to power, in order to follow Foucault further, may namely emerge in a seemingly democratic discourse.School development may sound appropriate and commendable, just like student care can, but even such terms presuppose something, such as students would be especially in need of care or that schools would be particularly in need of development. Of course, that kind of axioms may be questioned, when in fact they are historically specific offers of certain ways of thinking, which could have been thought of differently (Börjesson, 2003, s. 20, own translation). For example, many of the perspectives on school development refer to democratic ideals and invoke also social improvement and a humanistic and liberal discourse.Wetherell and Potter (1992) mean ideology to be something that occurs also in scientific contexts and that science must for that reason be made accessible for critical attention. Such critical attention can be understood as some sort of deconstruction of the processes and discursive practices, which help to fixate some claims and to ascribe them authority as neutral fact and truth.