Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

The Production of the Problem of Difference in Neoliberal Educational Policies

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Ethnography and Education Policy

Part of the book series: Education Policy & Social Inequality ((EPSI,volume 3))

  • 462 Accesses

Abstract

Within the framework of an educational system based on administrative and financial neoliberal principles, this chapter responds to questions related to how educational policies produce and circulate discourses of difference and how such discourses play out in schools. The aim is to problematize Chilean educational policies of inclusion focusing specifically on mechanisms of production, operation, and articulation, as well as the ways educational actors circulate discourses of difference. To do this, I analyze three components: (1) policy documents, (2) the administering body, and (3) the school by unpacking discourses related to the policy of school community life and the inclusion of students with special needs. These discourses are tied to government rationality that develops the problem as a depoliticized matter of identity, linked to the deficit or lack of particular student subjectivities and therein, points to the objectification and management of, and intervention on social and cultural differences in a neoliberalized educational system.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 119.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    I use the notion of neoliberalism proposed by theorists like Brown (2015), Laval and Dardot (2013), who under the inspiration of Michel Foucault, consider rationality as a particular form of reason that configures all aspects of human existence in economic terms. Therefore, its scope would be given by the management of conduct and the production of subjectivities, under the principle of maximum freedom, and above all under the central premise of the “economization” of the different dimensions of life, whose impact does not only respond to the monetization of everyday behaviors and activities, but also refers to the commercialization and managerialization of noneconomic valuation schemes, such as education, health, and justice, among others. In Brown’s (2015) words: “as an order of normative reason that, when it becomes ascendant, takes shape as a governing rationality extending a specific formulation of economic values, practices, and metrics to every dimension of human life” (p. 30).

  2. 2.

    By discourse, I refer to the basic unit of social configuration, which is independent of the substratum that supports it (linguistic or extralinguistic), allows us to understand social organization (Scott 1992). There are three central components that are densely articulated: discourse-power-knowledge. In Foucault’s words: “the practices that systematically form the objects of which they speak” (Foucault 2011b, p. 68).

  3. 3.

    When I discuss the legislative framework of inclusion or Chilean diversity policies, I refer to policy as a document. I include in that category the set of laws, policies, and orientations in relation to the issues of diversity and inclusion. In the Chilean case, they have been developed from identitary marks (social class, disability, gender, ethnicity, among others).

  4. 4.

    Sur Austral is an elementary school located in a peripheral sector of a southern Chilean city. The student body is made up of students of low socioeconomic status, classified according to public policy as an at-risk population due to the School Vulnerability Index (90%). One of its particularities is the large decrease in enrollment within the last 10 years, dropping from 1,000 students to now 300 students. This led the school to open its doors to all policies that would allow it to survive financially. That is why Sur Austral relies economically on two critical programs: the School Integration Program (SIP) and the Preferential School Subsidy Law (SEP Law). Likewise, it also has a multidisciplinary professional team dedicated to the SIP and school climate. This is composed of: three psychologists, one social worker, one occupational therapist, one speech therapist, and five special education teachers.

  5. 5.

    In 2005, the number of students belonging to SIP amounts to 41,023 (Tenorio 2011). In 2011, with the implementation of Decree 170, those numbers increased to 130,139 students; in 2013, they increased to 221,416 students (Fundación Chile 2013). In 2014, there were 251,092 students who belonged to SIP (MINEDUC 2015) and in 2016, that number increased to 319,217 students (MINEDUC 2017), of which 17.6% corresponded to students diagnosed with an intellectual disability; a percentage that almost triples the prevalence of intellectual disability according to international literature (Fuenzalida 2014).

  6. 6.

    The Policy of School Community Life, framed within the Chilean Law of School Violence, corresponds to a set of regulations and technical guidelines that regulate the school climate within Chilean schools. Its assumption is to guarantee the basic conditions necessary for the achievement of quality learning (MINEDUC 2011a, b) from the regulation of sanctions in case of violent acts, to matters of prevention of school bullying, and other transversal issues such as citizen formation, sexual, and environmental education (MINEDUC 2011a, b).

References

  • Ahmed, S. (2007). The language of diversity. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 30(2), 235–256. https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870601143927.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Allan, E. (2003). Constructing women’s status: Policy discourses of university women’s commission reports. Harvard Educational Review, 73(1), 44–72.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bacchi, C. (1999). Women, Policy and Politics: The construction of policy problems. Great Britain: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bacchi, C. (2009). Analysing policy: What’s the problem represented to be? Frenchs Forest: Pearson Higher Education AU.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baez, B. (2004). The study of diversity—The “knowledge of difference” and the limits of science. Journal of Higher Education, 75(3), 285–306. https://doi.org/10.1080/00221546.2004.11772257.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Baez, B. (2014). Technologies of government: Politics and power in the “information age”. Charlotte: Information Age Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ball, S. (1993). What is policy? Texts, trajectories and toolboxes. The Australian Journal of Education Studies, 13(2), 10–17.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ball, S., & Youdell, D. (2008). Hidden privatisation in public education. Brussels: Education International Brussels.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bellei, C. (2015). El gran experimento. Mercado y privatización de la educación chilena. Santiago: LOM.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, W. (2008). Regulating aversion: Tolerance in the age of identity and empire. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, W. (2015). Undoing the demos: Neoliberalism’s stealth revolution. Cambridge: Zone Books Near Futures.

    Google Scholar 

  • Carrasco, A. (2013a). Performative mechanisms of educational institutions in Chile: Steps towards a new cultural subject. Revista Observatorio Cultural, 15, 7.

    Google Scholar 

  • Carrasco, A. (2013b). Politics based in privatization, standardization, examination, and educational accountability: The anglophone experience. Pensamiento Educativo, 50(2), 163–172.

    Google Scholar 

  • Carrasco, A., Seppänen, P., Rinne, R., & Falabella, A. (2015). Educational accountability in Chile and Finland. In P. Seppänen, A. Carrasco, M. Kalalahti, R. Rinne, & H. Simola (Eds.), Contrasting dynamics in education politics of extremes (Vol. 37, pp. 53–80). Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cooperativa, Radio (Producer). (2011, July 19). Presidente Piñera: la educación es un bien de consumo. Retrieved from http://www.cooperativa.cl/noticias/pais/educacion/proyectos/presidente-pinera-la-educacion-es-un-bien-de-consumo/2011-07-19/134829.html.

  • Duggan, L. (2004). The twilight of equality: Neoliberalism, cultural politics, and the attack on democracy. Boston: Beacon Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Falabella, A. (2014). The performing school: The effects of market & accountability policies. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 22(70). Retrieved from http://www.redalyc.org/html/2750/275031898024/.

  • Fardella, C., Sisto, V., Morales, K., Rivera, G., & Soto, R. (2012). Rendición de cuentas y trabajo público. La Ética en Tensión.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (2006). Seguridad, territorio, población. Buenos Aires: Fondo de la Cultura Económica.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (2008). Tecnologías del yo. Buenos Aires: Paidós/I.C.E.-U.A.B.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (2009). Nacimiento de la biopolítica: Curso del collège de France (1978–1979) (Vol. 283). Madrid: Ediciones Akal.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (2011a). El gobierno de sí y de los otros. Buenos Aires: Fondo de Cultura Económica.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (2011b). La arqueología del saber (A. Garzón, Trans. 2ª ed.). México: Siglo XXI.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fuenzalida, R. (2014). Los estilos educativos y su relación con la psicopatología en niños y adolescentes con discapacidad intelectual: un estudio comparativo entre Chile y España. (Doctoral), Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona, Barcelona.

    Google Scholar 

  • Henry, M., Lingard, B., Rizvi, F., & Taylor, S. (2001). The OECD, globalisation and education policy. Oxford: Pergamon Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Infante, M., Matus, C., & Vizcarra, R. (2011). Reasoning about the idea of difference in Chilean educational policies. Universum (Talca), 26(2), 143–163.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Laclau, E., & Mouffe, C. (2011). Hegemonía y estrategia socialista: Hacia una radicalización de la democracia. Buenos Aires: Fondo de la Cultura Económica.

    Google Scholar 

  • Laval, C., & Dardot, P. (2013). La nueva razón del mundo. Barcelona: GEDISA.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lemke, T. (2011). Foucault, governmentality and critique. Colorado: Paradigm Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Matus, C., & Infante, M. (2011). Undoing diversity: Knowledge and neoliberal discourses in colleges of education. Discourse-Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 32(3), 293–307. https://doi.org/10.1080/01596306.2011.573248.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Matus, C., & Rojas, C. (2015). Normalidad y diferencia en nuestras escuelas: a propósito de la Ley de Inclusión Escolar. Docencia, 56, 47–56.

    Google Scholar 

  • MINEDUC. (2008). Ley Subvención Escolar Preferencial (Ley SEP), Congreso Nacional, 20.248 Stat.

    Google Scholar 

  • MINEDUC. (2009). Set standards to determine students with special education needs who will be beneficiaries of special education grants. Decree 170 C.F.R.

    Google Scholar 

  • MINEDUC. (2011a). School Violence Law, 20.536 C.F.R.

    Google Scholar 

  • MINEDUC. (2011b). Política Nacional de Convivencia Escolar. Santiago: Ministerio de Educación. Retrieved from http://www.convivenciaescolar.cl.

  • MINEDUC. (2013). Orientaciones Técnicas Para los Programas de Integración Escolar (PIE). Santiago-Chile: MINEDUC.

    Google Scholar 

  • MINEDUC. (2015). Educación para la igualdad de género. Plan 2015–2018. Santiago: MINEDUC.

    Google Scholar 

  • MINEDUC. (2017). Orientaciones técnicas para la inclusión educativa de estudiantes extranjeros. Santiago: MINEDU. Retrieved from https://migrantes.mineduc.cl/wp-content/uploads/sites/88/2017/12/Orientaciones-estudiantes-extranjeros-21-12-17.pdf.

  • OCDE. (2018). Chile, primer país sudamericano miembro de la OCDE. Retrieved from http://www.oecd.org/chile/chileprimerpaissudamericanomiembrodelaocde.htm.

  • Pillow, W. (2007). ‘Bodies are dangerous:’ Using feminist genealogy as policy studies methodology. Journal of Education Policy, 18(2), 145–159.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Piñera, S. (2017). Programa de educación: mejoremos la sala de clase. Retrieved from http://educacion.sebastianpinera.cl/.

  • Power, S., & Frandji, D. (2010). Education markets, the new politics of recognition and the increasing fatalism towards inequality. Journal of Education Policy, 25(3), 385–396.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rizvi, F., & Lingard, B. (2013). Políticas educativas en un mundo globalizado. Madrid: Ediciones Morata.

    Google Scholar 

  • Romero, M. (2017). Piñera presenta sus propuestas en educación con énfasis en mejorar la calidad. Emol. Retrieved from http://www.emol.com/noticias/Nacional/2017/10/12/878944/Las-propuestas-de-Pinera-que-apuntan-a-mejorar-la-calidad-en-la-educacion.html.

  • Scott, J. (1992). Experiencia (M. Silva, Trans.). In J. Butler & J. Scott (Eds.), Feminists Theorize the Political (pp. 773–797). New York: Routledge Inc.

    Google Scholar 

  • Seppänen, P., Carrasco, A., Kalalahti, M., Rinne, R., & Simola, H. (Eds.). (2015). Contrasting dynamics in education politics of extremes (Vol. 37). Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sisto, V., & Zelaya, V. (2013). La etnografía de dispositivos como herramienta de análisis y el estudio del managerialismo como práctica local. Universitas Psychologica, 12(4), 1345–1354.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tenorio, S. (2011). Formación inicial docente y necesidades educativas especiales. Estudios pedagógicos, 37(2), 249–265. https://dx.doi.org/10.4067/S0718-07052011000200015.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Youdell, D. (2011). School trouble. Identity, power and politics in education. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia, Chile

    Marcela Apablaza

Authors
  1. Marcela Apablaza
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Marcela Apablaza .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Educational Justice, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Macul, Santiago (RM), Chile

    Claudia Matus

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Apablaza, M. (2019). The Production of the Problem of Difference in Neoliberal Educational Policies. In: Matus, C. (eds) Ethnography and Education Policy. Education Policy & Social Inequality, vol 3. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-8445-5_5

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-8445-5_5

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore

  • Print ISBN: 978-981-13-8444-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-981-13-8445-5

  • eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation