North by northwest: quality assurance and evaluation processes in European education

Governing processes in Europe and within Europeanization are often opaque and appearances can deceive. The normative practices of improvement in education, and the connected growth in performance measurement, have been largely understood in their own terms. However, the management of flows of information through quality assurance can be examined as a new form of governance, not just at the national level but within the broad policyscape of the European Union. The shaping of policy through data and the constant comparison for improvement against competition has come to be the standard by which public systems are judged. Indeed, public systems of education are recreated, and Europe is formed. The mediation of travelling policies and policy discourses across Europe constitute a polymorphic policyscape in which quality assurance and evaluation (QAE) has become a major instrument.

[1]  Richard J. Walter,et al.  Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (review) , 2012 .

[2]  Sotiria Grek.  From Symbols to Numbers: The Shifting Technologies of Education Governance in Europe , 2008 .

[3]  Ǻ. Gornitzka.  The Open Method of Coordination as practice - A watershed in European education policy? , 2006 .

[4]  Gerard Delanty,et al.  Book Review: Rethinking Europe: Social Theory and the Implications of Europeanization , 2006 .

[5]  R. A. Walks.  New State Spaces: Urban Governance and the Rescaling of Statehood , 2006 .

[6]  A. Dehmel.  Making a European area of lifelong learning a reality? Some critical reflections on the European Union’s lifelong learning policies , 2006 .

[7]  J. Ozga,et al.  Travelling and embedded policy: the case of knowledge transfer , 2006 .

[8]  S. Ball.  Education Policy and Social Class: The Selected Works of Stephen J. Ball , 2005 .

[9]  N. Brenner.  New State Spaces , 2004 .

[10]  Johanna Kallo,et al.  Too Eager to Comply? OECD Education Policies and the Finnish Response , 2004 .

[11]  Julie Sedel.  Three Sets of Indicators on Education: Education at a Glance (OECD), Key Data on Education (European Union), The State of Education (French Ministry of Education). Elements of Comparison and Analysis , 2004 .

[12]  Tim Richardson,et al.  Making European Space: Mobility, Power and Territorial Identity , 2003 .

[13]  M. Lawn.  The ‘Usefulness’ of Learning: the struggle over governance, meaning and the European education space , 2003 .

[14]  J. Teugels.  The Politics of Large Numbers: a History of Statistical Reasoning , 2003 .

[15]  C. Duke.  The OECD, Globalisation and Education Policy , 2003 .

[16]  Anto´Nio No´Voa,et al.  Comparative Research in Education: a mode of governance or a historical journey? , 2003 .

[17]  P. Bourdieu,et al.  Firing Back: Against the Tyranny of the Market 2 , 2003 .

[18]  M. Lawn,et al.  Constructing a European Policy Space in Educational Governance: The Role of Transnational Policy Actors , 2002 .

[19]  J. Urry.  Sociology beyond societies : mobilities for the twenty-first century , 2000 .

[20]  Cris Shore,et al.  Building Europe: The Cultural Politics of European Integration , 2000 .

[21]  R. Rinne.  The Globalisation of Education: Finnish education on the doorstep of the new EU millennium , 2000 .

[22]  M. Castells.  Materials for an exploratory theory of the network society , 2000 .

[23]  T. Popkewitz,et al.  Review of Research on Education Governance and Social Integration and Exclusion. Uppsala Reports on Education. , 1999 .

[24]  A. Desrosières,et al.  The Politics of Large Numbers: A History of Statistical Reasoning , 1999 .

[25]  N. Brenner.  Between Fixity and Motion: Accumulation, Territorial Organization and the Historical Geography of Spatial Scales , 1998 .

[26]  L. Quam.  The Audit Society: Rituals of Verification , 1998 .

[27]  F. Rizvi,et al.  Educational Policy and the Politics of Change , 1997 .

[28]  M. Castells.  The rise of the network society , 1996 .

[29]  C. Shore.  Inventing the people's Europe': critical approaches to European Community cultural policy' , 1993 .

[30]  David G. Marr.  Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. , 1985, The Journal of Asian Studies.

[31]  M. Lawn.  An Intellectual Homeland: Governing Mobilities and Space in European Education , 2007 .

[32]  T. Brennan.  Wars of Position: The Cultural Politics of Left and Right , 2006 .

[33]  M. Lawn,et al.  Fabricating Europe : the formation of an education space , 2002 .

[34]  T. Popkewitz,et al.  Education governance and social integration and exclusion: Studies in the powers of reason and the reasons of power , 2001 .

[35]  T. Popkewitz,et al.  Listening to education actors on governance and social integration and exclusion , 2001 .

[36]  T. Popkewitz,et al.  Education Governance and Social Integration and Exclusion: National Cases of Educational Systems and Recent Reforms. Uppsala Reports on Education 34. , 1999 .

[37]  T. Popkewitz,et al.  Public Discourses on Education Governance and Social Integration and Exclusion: Analyses of Policy Texts in European Contexts. Uppsala Reports on Education. , 1999 .

[38]  Guy Neave,et al.  The Evaluative State Reconsidered. , 1998 .

[39]  Linda Weiss.  Globalization and the myth of the powerless state , 1997 .

[40]  A. Appadurai.  Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization , 1996 .

[41]  Gerard Delanty.  Inventing Europe: Idea, Identity, Reality , 1995 .

[42]  N. Rose.  Governing by numbers: Figuring out democracy☆ , 1991 .

[43]  B. Anderson.  Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism , 1983 .