Page 52 - Šolsko polje, XXIX, 2018, no. 1-2: The Language of Neoliberal Education, ed. Mitja Sardoč
P. 52
šolsko polje, letnik xxix, številka 1–2
In fact, the idea of an opposition between civil society and the state was
formulated in a given context in response to a precise intention: some lib-
eral economists proposed it at the end of the eighteenth century to limit
the sphere of action of the state, civil society being conceived of as the
locus of an autonomous economic process. This was a quasi-polemical
concept, opposed to administrative options of states of that era, so that a
certain liberalism could flourish. (2000: p. 372).
Foucault’s writings on neoliberalism represent it as a dis-equaliz-
ing and anti-democratic force.15 What is more important, however, is that
while liberalism represented man as free and uncoerced, who obeyed mar-
ket laws because they were natural laws, as if ruled by an ‘invisible hand,’
in Smith’s words, neoliberalism is authoritarian in important respects.
This is in the sense that the faltering confidence in laissez-faire and natu-
ralism by liberals led those we can dub as neoliberals to advocate the ne-
cessity of the state constructing the ‘framework’ and the ‘conditions’ by
which the free market could be assured. What we have seen is that for the
German ordo liberals, their distrust in laissez-faire has meant that rather
than see the market as natural they see it as historical and in need of con-
ditioning by the state. There is the danger, of course, that this function
will be progressively ‘immunized’ from genuine democratic contestation
or control.
Amongst the public sector institutions who constitute part of the
‘conditions’ for a competitive market economy, are the various education-
al institutions, from pre-school to higher education, including univer-
sities. In higher education, for instance, neoliberal governmentality has
subverted what I have called elsewhere a ‘collegial-democratic’ model and
replaced it with a new model based upon external audits and performance
appraisals, premised upon performance incentive targets and increased
monitoring and managerialism.16 You can see the top-down, authoritarian
aspect of neoliberalism in the new forms of governmentality implemented
from the 1980s in universities. It gives a new significance to the notion of
‘rule by managers’ when one understands that the neoliberal theorists ad-
vocated the interpellation of a new strata of managers to counter the clas-
sical liberal conception of professionalism, based as it was upon an auton-
omy of spheres, and to counter it as a form of what Buchanan refers to as
‘rent-seeking’ behavior. In Britain, four years after Margaret Thatcher was
elected, for instance, the Griffith Report of 1983 premised reforms for the
health sector, which included the creation of a new senior management
15 But see Zamora and Behrent (2016) who maintain a contrary thesis.
16 See Raaper and Olssen, 2016.
50
In fact, the idea of an opposition between civil society and the state was
formulated in a given context in response to a precise intention: some lib-
eral economists proposed it at the end of the eighteenth century to limit
the sphere of action of the state, civil society being conceived of as the
locus of an autonomous economic process. This was a quasi-polemical
concept, opposed to administrative options of states of that era, so that a
certain liberalism could flourish. (2000: p. 372).
Foucault’s writings on neoliberalism represent it as a dis-equaliz-
ing and anti-democratic force.15 What is more important, however, is that
while liberalism represented man as free and uncoerced, who obeyed mar-
ket laws because they were natural laws, as if ruled by an ‘invisible hand,’
in Smith’s words, neoliberalism is authoritarian in important respects.
This is in the sense that the faltering confidence in laissez-faire and natu-
ralism by liberals led those we can dub as neoliberals to advocate the ne-
cessity of the state constructing the ‘framework’ and the ‘conditions’ by
which the free market could be assured. What we have seen is that for the
German ordo liberals, their distrust in laissez-faire has meant that rather
than see the market as natural they see it as historical and in need of con-
ditioning by the state. There is the danger, of course, that this function
will be progressively ‘immunized’ from genuine democratic contestation
or control.
Amongst the public sector institutions who constitute part of the
‘conditions’ for a competitive market economy, are the various education-
al institutions, from pre-school to higher education, including univer-
sities. In higher education, for instance, neoliberal governmentality has
subverted what I have called elsewhere a ‘collegial-democratic’ model and
replaced it with a new model based upon external audits and performance
appraisals, premised upon performance incentive targets and increased
monitoring and managerialism.16 You can see the top-down, authoritarian
aspect of neoliberalism in the new forms of governmentality implemented
from the 1980s in universities. It gives a new significance to the notion of
‘rule by managers’ when one understands that the neoliberal theorists ad-
vocated the interpellation of a new strata of managers to counter the clas-
sical liberal conception of professionalism, based as it was upon an auton-
omy of spheres, and to counter it as a form of what Buchanan refers to as
‘rent-seeking’ behavior. In Britain, four years after Margaret Thatcher was
elected, for instance, the Griffith Report of 1983 premised reforms for the
health sector, which included the creation of a new senior management
15 But see Zamora and Behrent (2016) who maintain a contrary thesis.
16 See Raaper and Olssen, 2016.
50
