British education discourse was reoriented toward Right themes within a decade

Evidence

We might turn to another area of successful colonization by the radical Right: the sphere of education. Until very recently, the social-democratic goals of “equality of opportunity” and “remedying educational disadvantage” were dominant throughout the world of secondary education. The struggle over comprehensivization was its political signature. Contestation in this area has only gradually developed, through a series of strategic interventions. The Black Paper group—at first no more than an elitist, education rump—has moved from very modest beginnings to the point where it could justly be claimed (and was) that its preoccupations set the agenda for the “Great Debate” which the Labour government initiated in 1978. In the 1960s “progressive” and “community” education made considerable advances within state schools. Today, “progressivism” is thoroughly discredited: the bodies of a whole series of well-publicized schools—William Tyndale and after, so to speak—lie strewn in its path. The panic over falling standards and working-class illiteracy, the fears concerning politically motivated teachers in the classroom, the scare stories about the “violent” urban school, about the adulteration of standards through the immigrant intake, and so on, have successfully turned the tide in the education sphere toward themes and goals established by the forces of the Right. — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 1122

Categorization

• XREF: A textbook case of Hall’s own ‘articulation’ concept applied to policy discourse — how contingent couplings, not inherent logic, shift a political field.