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This paper explores the emergence of the term 'polycentricity' in education policy research and compares its use in education to its historical use in its 'parent fields' of political science and economics. We focus on the leading role of Stephen Ball and colleagues in popularising the term in education, inspiring other education scholars to harness the term to examine contemporary governance arrangements. Our primary argument is that in broad "descriptive" terms, the use of the term in education generally mirrors its use in political science and economics. Its "prescriptive" usage, however, is very different, with arguments about the impacts of polycentricity in education policy often contrasting sharply with arguments in political science and economics. This has resulted, we argue, in core elements of the concept being 'lost in translation'. Yet, at the same time, its use in education has also generated new and important critical insights.

This paper engages with Morsy, Gulson and Clarke's response to the recent special issue of "Discourse" (Vol. 34, No. 2) that examined evolutions of markets and equity in education. We welcome Morsy, Gulson and Clarke's supplementation of the special issue with the genealogical analysis they provide of private school funding in Australia and the attention they draw to elisions of race, ethnicity, Indigeneity and whiteness in contemporary framings of equity in policy and research. We also clarify and expand on some of the aims and arguments that framed the special issue. However, we feel that any response adequate to the "event" that Morsy, Gulson and Clarke hope to stage--that is, a "debate redux" and politics of dissensus in education as an antidote to depoliticisation--must extend beyond the rehearsal of pre-existing positions; it cannot stop at endorsing or critiquing the points raised in their paper, or reiterating the rationales and arguments of the special issue. We therefore respond by gesturing towards possibilities for "disagreement", in the sense that Jacques Ranciere gives this term, about the political vocation of critical policy sociologists, and the modes of doing and being that can be seen as "critical" and "political" in academic education research. We do not disagree with Morsy, Gulson and Clarke in the usual sense; for that reason, we engage seriously with their call for a politics of dissensus in education.

This paper explores the emergence of the term 'polycentricity' in education policy research and compares its use in education to its historical use in its 'parent fields' of political science and economics. We focus on the leading role of Stephen Ball and colleagues in popularising the term in education, inspiring other education scholars to harness the term to examine contemporary governance arrangements. Our primary argument is that in broad descriptive terms, the use of the term in education generally mirrors its use in political science and economics. Its prescriptive usage, however, is very different, with arguments about the impacts of polycentricity in education policy often contrasting sharply with arguments in political science and economics. This has resulted, we argue, in core elements of the concept being 'lost in translation'. Yet, at the same time, its use in education has also generated new and important critical insights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a review of the concept of assembling policy in the understanding of social and non-social formations in educational policies. Topics discussed include the philosophical works and perspectives of Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, along with the points raised by Sebastien Ureta's book, "Assembling Policy: Transantiago, Human Devices, and the Dream of a World-Class Society."