Abstract
Over the past 15 years, the development of transnational actors in education has been followed by the strengthening and dominance of evidence-based educational research and policy. The paradigmatic shift toward forms of (quasi-)experimentally generated knowledge is increasingly used to construct evidence-based education as a “global project of innovation.” This chapter examines how this shift or rationale is popularized and disseminated by addressing everyone to take up the position of global expertise. For this purpose, the chapter investigates “authorization,” that is, the practices and strategies that are used to present evidence-based knowledge as legitimate or reasonable. While taking into consideration different kinds of empirical materials, the chapter’s main focus is placed on Pearson. Following the authorization strategies from Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) functionary Andreas Schleicher to Pearson’s digital learning platform Revel, it is demonstrated how Pearson succeeds in using evidence-based research to its own market advantage—in the name of scientific authority.
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- 1.
See, for instance, Bellmann and Müller (2011) for the discourse on evidence-based education.
- 2.
Here, I am referring to previous results, which have been published in German with a focus on “educational research on subject-formation” (Thompson, 2018). In this chapter, I am focusing on the practices of legitimation and authorization.
- 3.
The case of non-compliance in medicine is a good example that medical knowledge is not in and of itself authorizing. It has to become a part of the doctor-patient-relation in such a way that it can shape the medical treatment.
- 4.
The behavioral-economic approaches of “nudging” have been implemented in numerous areas of life. In this context, the power of data constitution is justified via libertarian paternalism.
- 5.
Weber (2000) has differentiated traditional, rational, as well as charismatic forms of domination or authority thereby bringing into view how they depend on different strategies of authorization within the social order: for example, the bureaucratic structure within rational domination or the extra-ordinary self-presentation in the context of charismatic domination.
- 6.
- 7.
Gert Biesta (2015) described the “psychological way of thinking” connected with PISA (social psychology) as addressing the “fear of being left behind.” PISA would equally address the fears and worries of the nations and individuals to be “left behind” or “fall back” in response to the social and economic transformations. The numbers and statistics would be turned into a superficial observation and tempt everyone to accept the simplicity and order presented in the scale (Biesta, 2015, p. 351). One is tempted to take part, even if one were to admit that the quality of the educational system cannot be determined solely in terms of the PISA results.
- 8.
The singularization of responsibility can be illustrated with a heading that Schleicher used together with Zoido (2016, p. 374): “In the Dark, All Schools and Education Systems Look the Same.”
- 9.
The TED Talks are precisely addressed toward the broader public. The motto of the talks are: “Ideas worth spreading” (TED, 2017).
- 10.
Pearson presents itself as an instance whose understands its data services as achievements and services for the community.
- 11.
Barber (2014, p. 76) articulates his educational-political self-conception in a different context as follows: “I think that a lot of my personal work in government was about bringing data to the point of decision. And good data.”
- 12.
Here the analysis deviates from the other studies, which emphasize that the digital preparation, above all, the investigation of pedagogical institutions and spaces take place from a removed perspective (see Decuypere, Ceulemens, & Simons, 2014).
- 13.
See also the “Pearson Community” to Revel (Revel, 2017).
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Thompson, C. (2019). The Globalized Expert: On the Dissemination and Authorization of Evidence-Based Education. In: Parreira do Amaral, M., Steiner-Khamsi, G., Thompson, C. (eds) Researching the Global Education Industry. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-04236-3_10
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