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Interventions instated to disrupt the destructive effects of the school-to-prison pipeline on students of color were repealed as a result of the US Education Department's 2018 Federal Commission on School Safety report. Using a critical policy and critical discourse framework, this paper examines how the language used in the report facilitated the process of repeal while concealing the insidious effects that the repeal could have on students of color and especially black students. Based on this analysis, the paper argues that education policy discourse is influenced by and supports the covert operation of white supremacist ideological structures that hinder the struggle for equity and justice in education.

Widespread neoliberal approaches to education consider schools increasingly accountable for self-management and 'client' recruitment, encapsulating economic ideologies that assume privatisation is essential for social progress. With an ever-shifting landscape of market-driven policies and the increasing growth of private education settings, more research is needed to cast light on emerging or under-researched aspects of "autonomous schools." Located within a U.S. state that has strict constraints on tax subsidies for religious K-12 education, this paper investigates how an extensive form of "decentralisation" corresponds with schools' discipline and ethical environment. It analyses teacher interviews and web documents from faith-based, autonomous schools in a state that has "devolved" power and authority for decision-making to parents and other independent 'agents', having a distanced relationship with its non-state 'actors'. The paper follows Foucault's use of the metaphor of the "panopticon" and adopts his power analysis to examine the nature of "parental control" and its influence on disciplinary and ethical practices. Evidence suggests that these autonomous schools are driven by a "'mini-public' ideology" that constrains educators' autonomy and generates particular disciplinary norms; entangling ethical, educational, and social ramifications, including teacher resistance and "teacher demoralisation." Implications for policy are discussed in this context of control.

Community participation is a vital component of the educational decentralisation policies that are now widespread in Nigeria. In this paper, we explore school-community relations in different localities in northern Nigeria, where there is both very little inter-generational experience of schooling and minimal engagement by local communities in social and political management processes. Drawing on ethnographic data in and around six primary schools in Adamawa State, northern Nigeria, we problematise school-community relations and highlight the complexities and tensions in their social interactions. This we do by focusing on the school boundary that both connects and distinguishes it from the surrounding community. In particular, we explore the agonistic spatial and temporal regulation that operates at the school boundary, with specific attention to the different ways that students, teachers and the community comply or resist such strategies of governmentality. In concluding, we argue that it is imperative to think through the implications for/of international education and development policies as they are launched in diverse localities. This would help to avoid accounts of local deficit that are so readily invoked when top-down policies reach communities.

Widespread neoliberal approaches to education consider schools increasingly accountable for self-management and 'client' recruitment, encapsulating economic ideologies that assume privatisation is essential for social progress. With an ever-shifting landscape of market-driven policies and the increasing growth of private education settings, more research is needed to cast light on emerging or under-researched aspects of autonomous schools. Located within a U.S. state that has strict constraints on tax subsidies for religious K-12 education, this paper investigates how an extensive form of decentralisation corresponds with schools' discipline and ethical environment. It analyses teacher interviews and web documents from faith-based, autonomous schools in a state that has devolved power and authority for decision-making to parents and other independent 'agents', having a distanced relationship with its nonstate 'actors'. The paper follows Foucault's use of the metaphor of the panopticon and adopts his power analysis to examine the nature of parental control and its influence on disciplinary and ethical practices. Evidence suggests that these autonomous schools are driven by a 'mini-public' ideology that constrains educators' autonomy and generates particular disciplinary norms; entangling ethical, educational, and social ramifications, including teacher resistance and teacher demoralisation. Implications for policy are discussed in this context of control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Besides Foucault's own focus on liberal contexts, the relatively limited application of his thoughts in illiberal countries may also result from the misunderstanding of power. The traditional juridico-discursive model interprets power as a possession wielded by one group over others, merely functioning as something forbidden. Thus, policy analysts risk falling into the trap of 'naive optimism or pessimism' – by overemphasizing either the secondary adjustment or strict sovereign control. Returning to Foucault's observation of the 'sovereignty–discipline–government society' triangle, this study examines how discipline establishes the linkage between sovereign will and self-government in both (neo)liberal and illiberal nations, aiming to: first, theoretically clarify how modern forms of power in different political systems overlap and co-operate with each other, thus justifying the expansion of Foucault's ideas into illiberal contexts; second, demonstrate the interpenetration of agency and constraints through empirical exploration of Chinese transnational higher education policy enactment, and by so doing to avoid the centralization circle or policy experimentation hypothesis framework; third, highlight the importance of discipline in realizing the 'tricky combination' of totalization and individualization through producing capable subjects for authoritarian objective in modern societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a Foucauldian analysis of the political rationalities of national testing and accountability practices in Australia, and their inconsistencies for students for whom English is a second or additional language. It focuses on a problem associated with the statistical data category ‘Language Background Other Than English’ (LBOTE) in the Australian national testing system. There is large variation in the performance of LBOTE students, but the average score of the group serves to homogenise the category and silence the association between language and test performance. Using Foucault’s ideas about governmentality and disciplinary power, this article examines the technologies of power evident in the Australian education reforms, in order to challenge a particular version of reality, created by the LBOTE category. The impact of disciplinary power on English as a Second Language (ESL) teachers is signalled, as they navigate the dual demands of meeting education accountabilities whilst supporting high needs ESL learners. This article challenges the idea that current accountabilities are able to address the goal of equity for all Australian students, rather suggesting that a focus on test performance, represented by statistical categories like LBOTE, undermines implementation of specialist pedagogy, and demands that teachers transform their practice to satisfy systemic need rather than student need. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]