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Firmly Bolted into the Air: Wishful Rationalism as a Discursive Basis for Educational Reform by Hannu Simola - 1998The aim of this article is to promote a better understanding of the problematic rela tions
between public reform discourse and the reality of schooling. The subject is the
paradox of educational reforms: while superficially decisive, they seem, at the same
time, to be deficient and insufficient. The article proposes that one explanation for
this “vicious circle?of educational reform might be traced to the discursive dynamics
of school reform rather than to the reforms themselves. The article is based on empirical
findings and theoretical constructions developed in a Finnish study. Although
the case is limited to a peripheral and small country, it may have more general
implications. The analysis of changes in official Finnish school discourse since the
late 1960’s identifies four characteristic features: individualization, “disciplinization,?
goal rationalization, and decontextualization. These changes then constitute
a curious intertwining of utopianism and rationalism, a “wishful rationalism,?as
a tacit discursive principle of the authoritarian approach to school reform. Reading
official school discourse with this specific logic in mind seems to reveal something
about the inner dynamics and paradoxes of educational reform.To view the full-text for this article you must be signed-in with the appropriate membership. Please review your options below:
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- Hannu Simola
Academy of Finland
Hanna Simola is senior research fellow of the Academy of Finland and docent in the sociology of education, University of Helsinki. He is the co-author of "Didactic Closure: Professionalization and Pedagogic Knowledge in Finnish Teacher Education" (Teaching and Teacher Education, 1997).
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