Uddannelsespolitiske ambitioner i det 21. århundrede: Nyliberalismens konsekvenser for uddannelser, individer og samfund

Abstract

The point of departure for this master’s thesis is the American professor and political theorist Wendy Brown and her thoughts on how neoliberalism as a governmental rationality has dramatically changed the way in which the modern state operates, as well as how it observes its citizens. Through Brown’s reading of Michel Foucault’s theory on neoliberalism and governmentality, this thesis seeks to examine how neoliberalism as a rationality has transformed the Danish education system since the turn of the millennium and to consider what consequences these changes have had and continue to have for students at Danish universities. This transformation is perceived in the language used by the Danish government and the Ministry of Higher Education and Science in addressing the Danish education system. The theoretical foundations for this analysis of governmental and institutional language is Gilles Deleuze’s and Félix Guattari’s perspective on language as a function that produces the concept of order-words. Deleuze’s and Guattari’s perspective on language serves as a mechanism that, in terms of Foucault’s governmental biopolitics, can be used as a way to observe how power is exercised on subjects. Furthermore, this thesis includes Hans Georg Gadamer’s perspective on hermeneutics as defining how language can be interpreted and understood and how language is part of its own history of effect that changes the meanings of concepts over time. This theoretical framework makes it possible to examine the thesis’ research question. The methodological approach of this thesis again originates from Michel Foucault and his constructive and epistemological perspective on problematization as a new way of questioning different phenomena and as a method for reaching new realizations and solutions. The analysis is separated into three parts: The first part seeks to analyze the way in which neoliberal rationality is present in the language used by the government and Ministry of Education in their strategical publications. The second part examines the use of the concept of innovation and how the perception of this concept has changed as part of its own history of effect. The last part analyzes the consequences of this new political rationality, how the language of the government and Ministry of Education can be seen as constituting order-words that change the way students perceive themselves. The thesis concludes that neoliberal rationality is implemented to a high degree in the educational politics, and that it has changed through the years. From a rationality seeking to create a better interaction between science and the market, it is now configured as a rationality that seeks to produce economic growth, through a biopolitical governance of students