There are various configurations for the analysis of education policy; the case; a history; comparison between (e.g. countries); comparison within; etc. In this issue, we have a set of papers from one country – Australia – covering a range of points of policy that exemplify many aspects of the current assemblage of global education reform activity. Australia is a site of policy ferment, of policy hyper-activity – reform is being done from top to bottom (early childhood to HE), in assessment and accountability, curriculum and pedagogy and the arrangements for service delivery, in the name of … That is not always clear. There are policies of devolution, centralised control, privatisation, autonomy and more, all at the same time. This is a ferment of change and indeed of incoherence. This all makes horrible sense and no sense at all. It brings into play new sorts of policy actors and voices, new sites of policy and new methods of policymaking and enactment. In relation to this, the analyst’s task is to understand the individual policies in their own right, and their effects and consequences, and at the same time the relation between policies across the system, if there is a system, and the effects and consequences of that relation. We must be careful not to attribute too much rationality to all of this reform activity, but at the same time not under estimate the underlying epistemic principles.
Many of the recurring tropes of global education policy are represented in the issue at different levels and with different points of focus. Fenech addresses the deployment of quality as an instrument of reform and management. Gerrard considers the nexus between education, enterprise and work as a form of social relations and as a basis for an ideal reform subject, with homeless sellers of The Big Issue as the case in point. Graham and colleagues explore the ways in which students are conceptualised in policy documents that articulate participation and equity. Savage focuses at the national level on the ‘alignment’ of policies across the states. Cumming considers the use of assessment policies and the contradictions between assessment and learning and the implications of that for teachers’ professional development. What should teachers attend to? How students learn or how they perform? Are they the same? Policy suggests they are. Teachers are not so sure Finally, Molla looks at the way school leaders, key policy actors in the miasma, complexity and irrationality of reform, comply with, compromise with or contest national equity agendas in their schools.