Metrics, Markets, and Equity: An Australian Story

• In Event: 53.036 - Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Education Inequalities: Exploring Alternatives to the "Neoliberalism" Critique

Abstract

When new education reforms were announced in Australia in 2008, the main focus was reducing inequity by addressing the ‘pockets of disadvantage’ that existed in the nation which was, on the whole, doing well in international rankings (Commonwealth of Australia, 2008). Eight years and millions of dollars later, we have new testing regimes, increased competition in a marketized environment, even greater inequity and slipping international rankings. This paper explores the links between metrics, markets and equity in the context of Australian policy. In addition to critiquing these policies, it also focuses on critique itself. Much critique of neoliberal education reforms has come in the form of an attack on neoliberalism itself as an ideology. This paper demonstrates that empirical, practice-oriented approaches such as Actor-Network Theory (ANT) may offer useful, alternatives ways to critique and intervene in contemporary education policy initiatives.

Objectives
This paper has dual aims: a. to demonstrate how metrics and measures of transparency designed to alleviate inequity themselves aid the creation of competitive markets that, in turn, exacerbate inequities; and b. to demonstrate the value of ANT in understanding and speaking back to current policy phenomena such as marketization.

Theoretical framework
This study utilizes the inter-disciplinary theoretical and methodological resources of ANT. Closely associated with controversy studies, ANT is eminently suited to the task of tracing how phenomena such as ‘markets’ come to be assembled and stabilized (Callon & Muniesa, 2005; Cochoy, 2007). The focus is on the processes of and practices of marketization.

Modes of inquiry
Analysing the reforms forensically, and using the ANT concept of ‘translation’, this paper traces how new metrics were introduced, that in turn enabled homogenization, transparency, and the coordination of action required for marketization.

Data sources
Data sources include government websites, newspaper reports and government media releases, as well as the study of policy documents that spanned the duration from the introduction of a new set of reforms in 2008 through to their consolidation over a period of six years.

Substantiated conclusions
The study demonstrates that the metrics that are meant to increase transparency and reduce inequity are also crucial for marketization, which has served to exacerbate inequity.

Scientific or scholarly significance
Although ANT is used in such fields as economics, science studies and law, its value in the study of education policy is only now being explored. Eschewing strong theories such as ‘neoliberalism’ as ready-made explanations in the study of education reform, it takes phenomena such as ‘the market’ itself to be in need of explanation. By focusing on practices and the heterogeneous actors involved in these practices, this paper argues, we can open up new possibilities for speaking back to reforms and for intervening in meaningful ways to resist inequitable reforms. The paper makes a case for a new approach to critique – one that is empirical and practice-oriented.

Author

• Radhika Gorur, Deakin University