Overview

This work examines the political context of the enactment of recent educational policies. It traces the replacement of a broadly social democratic consensus view on the purpose of state education with the radical market-led neo-liberal policies of successive Conservative and New Labour governments. This study advances several conclusions. First, it demonstrates that the evidence gathered supports the view that current educational reforms represent an assault on teachers' identity that has a damaging effect of the education system. Second, the work serves to reveal the concerns among senior professionals regarding the widening social divide within secondary education. Third, the research supports the need to engage senior professionals within a meaningful social and political context - one clearly founded on a concern for social justice. And finally, this study contradicts any attempt to label senior professionals as 'neo-conservative' or 'technical-instrumentalists', or for that matter as compliant or 'Luddite' opponents of educational reform.

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What makes [this] book particularly insightful and important to read is its use of phenomenological analysis to underscore the 'political economy' theoretical approach to 'the reform agenda' [in the UK]. - Prof. Mike Cole Bishop Grosseteste University College ... this book is a timely warning to those in a position to influence that the future direction of state education that relies upon crude target setting and inappropriate and divisive management models cannot succeed in providing the quality of education children deserve. - Prof. Dave Hill University of Northampton

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