The Struggle to Perform the Political Economy of Creditworthiness

Analysing the European Union's regulatory response in the wake of the credit and sovereign debt crises, this paper argues how its adoption of risk management as the core strategy for governing the credit ratings space may undermine European efforts to rebalance the growing asymmetry between private expertise and public democracy. While centralised oversight, enhanced transparency and restorative, technical intervention seem like sound regulatory initiatives, I problematise the methodologies, models and assumptions of sovereign ratings to show how the new ratings framework may actually impede the ability of the technocratic European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) to redress the most egregious deficiencies of ratings. Drawing on the performativity of market relations, the paper argues how ESMA's supervisory conflicts undermine the EU's capacity to perform an alternative political economy of limits. Neither is it democratically sanctioned to interfere in the analytical substance of ratings nor should it distort the social facticity of creditworthiness by relying primarily on quantitative risk analysis, ESMA will be forced to either repoliticise the ratings process or promote the status quo, which diminishes fiscal sovereignty.     

Performativity,Performance and Education

This article explores Lyotard’s notion of performativity through an engagement with McKenzie’s analysis of performance as a ‘formation of knowledge and power’ that has displaced the notion of discipline as the tool for social evaluation. Through conditions of ‘performance’ capitalism, education is to conform to a logic of performativity that ensures not only the efficient operation of the state in the world market, but also the continuation of a global culture of performance. I further trace Lyotard’s postmodern aesthetic of experimentation through performance as an ‘event’ in an analogous attempt to track the process of cultural production in terms that acknowledge the temporality of the event so as not to reduce the artwork to a commodity, knowledge to information, and ‘performance’ to be managed. Where this has critical traction is in education, a site that deals with the intersection of politics, art, theory, philosophy and history—in short, a site where all aspects of ‘performance’ are fully realized. This article engages with the key ideas of these thinkers’ approaches to notions of performance, and assesses their relevance for an understanding of the ambiguities of ‘performance’ in contemporary education institutions.     

Paying the price for being inclusive: the story of Marshlands

This article illustrates, through the story of one mainstream primary school, the tensions between the inclusion agenda and the standards agenda. The school is situated in an area of social deprivation and nearly half of the school population have been identified as having special educational needs. The story presented in this article illustrates powerfully the inherent injustice of the performative culture which pervades education and the effects of this discourse for children with special educational needs and their teachers. I argue that a policy change is needed to create a more equitable education system and that, in the absence of such a change, schools such as the one presented here will risk being categorised as failing schools. This will have disastrous consequences for the teachers' careers, children's self‐concepts and the inclusion agenda itself.     

The ordinary school – what is it?

In this paper we describe some of the complexities involved in the construction of a sample of ‘ordinary’ schools. We outline the policy context in England that produces pressures to resist ‘ordinariness’. The paper then explores two theoretical tools, fabrication and rhetoric, that are deployed in an analysis of some key artefacts of fabrication from schools in England. Through an examination of artefacts such as school brochures and websites, this paper asks whether there are any ‘ordinary’ schools in these performative times?     

How inclusion became exclusion: policy,teachers and inclusive education

ABSTRACT

It is almost two decades since a concept of inclusion as selective segregation was proposed as an alternative to the concept of full inclusion and inclusive education was reconfigured as providing children with varied educational settings in order to meet their needs. A version of this model of inclusive education subsequently gained political traction in England where the issue of segregated or mainstream provision is now constructed as a matter of parental choice and child voice. Meanwhile, the implications of this latest model of inclusive education for teachers and schools in a rapidly changing wider educational landscape have largely been ignored or reduced to a question of training. This paper explores how the inclusive education landscape has changed in England in recent years, charting recent key developments in areas such as policy, statutory guidance and teacher training, with particular reference to teacher workload and the positioning of teachers within political and polemical educational discourse.     

巴特勒的性别理论与性政治

巴特勒的性别理论源于对福柯思想尤其是《性经验史》的考察与发展,通过对男女性别二分法的系谱学考察。巴特勒揭示出,生理性别与社会性别并无根本差别,生理性别就是社会性别。性别就是一种述行行为。同时,基于这一思想,巴特勒提出来自己的性别政治——酷儿政治和再赋义的政治。     

Sport management student as producer: embedding critical management studies in sport through contemporary pedagogy

In recent years there has been growing interest over the role of major sport events and the sports industry. The aftermath of 2008 global crisis exposed the myth of ‘end of history’ and raised several questions over the role of management and organisational practices and theories in all aspects of human activity, including sport. This article reviews the emergence of critical management studies (CMS) as a field within management and organisational studies. We focus on critical performativity theory (CPT) as a key concept of re-configuring managerial practices. We add our voices to those asking for more critical output in sport management and point out the potential contribution of CMS in sport and especially of CPT. Finally, we propose ‘student as producer’ as a pedagogical framework to act as a possible basis for incorporating critical theories into higher education teaching. We argue that this framework can contribute significantly towards providing future graduates with the skills and knowledge to enable them to deal with the contemporary challenges of modern sport’s industry and wider society.     

The comic counterfactual: Laughter,affect, and civic alternatives

This project contributes the comic counterfactual to the critical lexicon of rhetorical studies. Using a range of examples from political comedy, this paper offers six distinguishing features and several temporal functions of this concept. I argue that the comic counterfactual invites audiences to critically reflect upon the political, social, and performative consequences of historical events by bringing affective, sensory weight to alternative visions, moving unaccountable private interests into public culture, targeting the subtle determinisms that can easily creep into communication, and creating plausible ways to reworld the status quo. I discuss the limitations of the comic counterfactual in the political economy of media and offer several conclusions for rhetorical research and practice.     

论海明威的性别困惑——以其短篇小说为例

海明威的性别观一直是海明威研究中的关注热点之一。以朱迪斯.巴特勒的性别表演理论为依据,以海明威的短篇小说为研究文本,从男女换装、性别角色转换和同性恋欲望三个理论层面,探讨海明威的性别观,得出结论:海明威并非提倡传统性别角色,拥护男性至上;他在短篇小说中描写社会性别的不定性和可变性,是其对现代社会中性别角色变化和重构的深切关注,是其"双性和谐"理想的表达,这一理想贯穿着海明威的整个写作生涯。     

Leadership in a Performative Context: A framework for decision-making

Abstract

This paper examines a model of decision-making within the context of current and emerging regimes of accountability being proposed and implemented for school systems in a number of jurisdictions. These approaches to accountability typically involve the use of various measurable student learning outcomes as well as other measures of performance to do with teachers and schools in general, often having high-stakes consequences. Given this context of performativity, the paper proposes a model that uses an objective knowledge growth framework, where teachers can engage in their own professional learning through defined structures for solving the problems of their professional practice. The model is both empowering for teachers while being sensitive to the constraints of cultures of performativity.