Philantocracy: Philanthropic Governance, the Commercialization of Education, and That Thing Called "Democracy"

• In Event: The Global Education Industry: The Role of Corporations and Philanthropies in Setting Education Agendas

Abstract

By coining the term ‘philanthropic governance’ in previous papers, we aimed to highlight the important changes in the way in which education policy is enacted due to the recent emergence of new venture philanthropists, social entrepreneurs, and neoliberal policy advocates and the new ways in which they configure and perform their political agendas.

This paper sketches some of the new ways through which these changes are being enacted. More specifically, it will analyse the new methods of policy linked to what is known as philanthrocapitalism (Bishop & Green, 2010). This new philanthropic approach has gained an increasingly important political dimension, becoming a central explanatory variable to understand the recent changes and directions of national and international political agendas in different parts of the world(see Ball & Olmedo, 2012). These transformations represent new forms of governmentality and power regimes and are deeply rooted within the political economy and political philosophy of neoliberalism. According to Jessop (2002), they also facilitate the transition to a new political framework characterised by new forms of coordination, or ‘heterarchies’. The analytical approach to what is referred to here as ‘the global’ responds to the set of discrete, identifiable and traceable practices (connections, transactions, meetings, travels, influences and impositions, etc.), through which international economic and political relationships are enacted.

More specifically, it reflects on a set of ‘new’ edu-enterprises, their connections, ideological influences and agendas on the ground. Within the field of policy analysis, “policy network analysis seeks to identify the important actors – governmental and nongovernmental organizations, interest groups, and persons involved in policymaking institutions, to describe and explain the structure of their interactions during policymaking processes, and to explain and predict collective policy decision and outcomes” (Knoke, 2011, p. 210). To do so, the paper furthers previous analysis (see Olmedo, 2013) on the organisational configuration and international operations of the English charitable company: ARK (Absolute Return for Kids). More concretely, it focuses on the new policy solutions promoted by and through the members that configure ARK’s policy network. It will be suggested that the role and nature of profit is not only blurred but is also blurring other dimensions in the realm of policy and politics.

Methodologically, the paper brings together tools from Social Network Analysis (SNA) with more traditional ethnographic methods. The approach adapts and develops further the method of “network ethnography”(Howard, 2002) and responds to Bevir and Rhodes’ (2006) call for “ethnographic analyses of governance in action”.

The aim of the paper is to raise a number of questions and concerns on the potential impact that these new policy actors could be exerting over democratic processes and political practices. The cases and examples presented throughout illustrate Horne’s (2002) claims of the existence of a ‘parapolitical sphere’ within which new philanthropists would be operating and developing their own policy agendas. The direct involvement of these new players in the political sphere implies changes in the steering of democratic societies, and, most importantly, in terms of social accountability and control.

Author

• Antonio Olmedo, Institute of Education - University of London