New right view of education

The new right view education through an economic lens:

• they see skills as part of a system that should promote competition, choice and efficiency

• Schools should focus on raising standards to meet the needs of the global economy

• They advocate for greater marketisation, where schools compete like businesses and parents act as consumers

  • competition improves standards and efficiency

• Under performing skills should lose funding or be taken over, while successful ones are rewarded

What do the New Right say about the state?

• They believe that the state interferes too much peoples lives and should instead play a minimal role in society

• They believe the state has failed to provide high-quality education, and its rule should be limited to:

  • Setting the national curriculum to promote shared values

  • E.g. British history, Christian values and citizenship to promote social cohesion

  • Ensuring a framework for schools to operate in

  • Via Ofsted, league tables and standardised testing, this state helps monitor school quality while allowing school choice and competition

Chubb + Moe

Key New Right thinkers who argue that:

• State schools have failed to meet the needs of pupils, parents and the economy because:

  • The standard of education is low, especially for disadvantage groups

  • They have failed to produce workers with the right skills

  • They have led to high levels of unemployment

• Privately run skills in the USA perform better because they are accountable to paying consumers

  • they recommend a voucher system where parents are given public money to spend on a school of their choice

  • This would force skills to compete, raise standards and be more responsive to parental demand

  • Chubb and Moe believed this would create a parentocracy – a system driven by consumer power, not government control

Influence on education policy

Venue right has had a major impact on UK education since the 1980s:

• 1980s - 1990s: introduction of vocational education and marketisation, under the 1988 education reform act

• 1997-2010 - new labour supported academies and performance targets, (shows the New Right influence even under centre-left governments)

• 2010-2015 - The coalition government expanded academies and free schools, this reinforced privatisation and parental choice

Evaluation of the new right perspective: Strengths

• Focus on standards and accountability

  • By introducing Ofsted inspections, league tables and standardised testing, schools became more accountable for student outcomes

  • These measures have improved results and some failing schools

• Promotion of parental choice

  • By giving parents the right to choose, schools having improved in attracting pupils

  • This parentocracy supposedly empowered families and encouraged innovation

• influential policy reforms

  • New right thinking has led to the creation of academies and a focus on traditional teaching

  • These reforms have led higher exam results in some disadvantage areas

Evaluation of the new right perspective: criticisms

• reproduction of inequality

  • Argue that middle class parents are better able to exercise school choice due to their economic and cultural capital

  • This reinforces social class divisions

• marketisation favours high performing students

  • Skills are incentivised to reward the most able students and discriminate against those who require extra support

  • This creates a two tier system and undermines the idea of equality of opportunity

• Ethnocentric and narrow curriculum

  • The national curriculum is criticised for reflecting a white, middle class, Eurocentric view of British history and culture

  • This fails to represent the diversity of UK society and main marginalised ethnic minorities and working class students

• Profit over pupils

  • The increasing role of private providers in education raise concerns about the commodification of learning

  • Marxists argue that when companies prioritise profit, educational quality and student welfare can suffer