Presentation: Current governance of education systems and the regression of the right to education¹

Network of Studies and Research in Educational Planning and Management - (NSREPM) comes to present a dossier proposal aiming to share the results of a research developed by the group in the education field. NSREPM was constituted in 2013 with the objective to meet researchers from the all over Brazil and from Latin America who are dedicated to studies of planning and management of educational systems in international, national, and/or local approaches. Studies in this scientific field are increasingly challenged in view of the fiscal adjustments adopted by entities of the Brazilian federation, especially after the enactment of current legislation that sets a ceiling on social investments, which threatens the public and free character of school education. In addition, a conservative cultural project underway in Brazil and in other countries comes to dispute a political-pedagogical agenda of regression of human rights and of teaching exercise. The resurgence of society neoliberal project requires joining efforts of researchers and teaching workers to defend the right to public, secular, free, and emancipatory education.

Therefore, the debate on the new and old forms of regulation of educational systems management is relevant in this current context of resurgence of conservative and ultra-liberal forces. Since the 1990s, the Latin American and European educational policy fields have been problematizing the ways of regulation of public education that are managerialist, such as the market works.

Then, the literature in educational policy field focuses the analyzes in understanding the current governance of education systems in the globalization context. For that matter, the texts published in this dossier seek to analyze the educational policies forms of regulation carried out in Brazil, complementing the experiences of France and Argentina as examples of what has been happening in Europe and Latin America. The perspective on regulation is based on the work of Barroso (2005; 2018) and Maroy (2011) who understand that the management of educational policies should be thought of in terms of public action and no longer as a linear work of administration. Public policy studies should focus on the conflicts and arrangements built by a diversity of actors participating in a particular non-linear process, but composed of a multitude of state, public and private actions. Therefore, the term that best portrays the educational policies management is multi-regulation, because they occur at various levels - transnational, national, local - in which several actors (public and / or private) intervene in the governance context. Considered as a dynamic process, regulation is “a carrier of both order and new tensions” (MAROY, 2013). The works presented here are the results of researches that reveals the coexistence of old and new regulation forms of educational policy management.

The first issue, produced by professors Marília Fonseca, Eliza Bartolozzi Ferreira and Elisangela Alves da Silva Scaff, is the result of empirical research dedicated to the subject of management and educational planning. The text analyses Brazilian educational policy from the last decades of the twentieth century, whose initially state-centered regulation underwent acute transformations as early as the 1990s when transnational regulation is carried out in Brazilian education management. The text examines the configuration forms of educational management and planning after the military dictatorship period until the Lula da Silva government when the national and local regulation forms contributed to develop a democratic experience of educational planning presenting several organizational arrangements.

The issue written by Maria Aranda Alice de Miranda, Evally Solaine de Souza Rodrigues, and Sílvio Cesar Nunes Militão consists of a balance on the knowledge production regarding the monitoring and evaluation of the ten-year education plans, from 2001 to 2017, understood as the National Education Plan of Brazil (NEP²), State Education Plan (SEP³), and Municipal Education Plan (MEP⁴). The authors carry out a bibliographic and exploratory research of quali-quantitative nature, with significant contribution to the field still in formation. From this bibliographic effort, the text reveals the need for studies on ways that national and local regulation occurred in Brazil in the legal exercise of educational plans.

The third issue is a study developed by Jorge Gorostiaga, from Argentina. The aim of the text is to analyze how and to what extent the multilateral organizations rhetoric aligns with the promotion of post-bureaucratic regulation models of education in the Latin American context. The author analyses documents sponsored by regional multilateral agencies published between 2012 and 2018 in order to identify dominant themes and approaches, but also contradictions, variations, different emphases, and alternative approaches.

The issue by Maíra de Araújo Mamede, from Université Paris-Est Créteil, studies the French experience on its faculty characteristics. Specifically, the study addresses the policies of formation and entry into the teaching profession, highlighting their heterogeneity in a country with centralizing political characteristics. The text analyses data from the reality of the conditions of teaching workers that are interesting for comparative studies between countries that, despite their differences, are situated in a global education agenda whose dynamic process of regulation imprints old conflicts and installs new professional arrangements.

Collective production by Maura da Silva Miranda, Maria Couto Cunha, and Rodrigo da Silva Pereira, presents research results constructed from the analysis of documents and semi structured interviews with the aim at investigating institutional arrangements of territorial management of education through Public Consortia (PC) and Education Development Arrangements (EDA) in a public-private partnership, demonstrating ongoing initiatives in the state of Bahia with the Public Consortia under the governmental initiative. Preliminary results signal the regulation forms focused on the growth of public-private partnerships within the precepts of New Public Management that support the conformation of these arrangements.

From a research developed in Goiás state network (Brazil), professor Luciana Rosa Marques presents data from research carried out from interviews with leaders of schools with the largest and smallest rate at Basic Education Development Index (BEDI⁵) of the state, union of education professionals and secretary of education. The study search to verify what are the repercussions of New Public Management (NPM⁶) in education management of Goiás state public network, state highlighted by the good results achieved in large scale assessments. The author observes the coexistence of two logics: NPM and democratic management are in the discourse of participants on the research.

The issue by Marilda de Oliveira Costa and Cassia Domiciano brings critical reflections on the national and state political conjuncture of the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil. Specifically, the authors analyze legislation changes of democratic management in Mato Grosso education system and the public school for the formation of democratic and participative subjects. Their analysis lead to the conclusion that we live a management post-democracy, under the influence of the New Public Management (NPM) and from its managerial guidelines in replacement to the democratic management and its potentialities to build a democratic school.

Finally, the issue by Maria Jose Pires Barros Cardozo and Maria Lília Imbiriba Sousa Colares proposes the discussion of Education Municipal Systems (EMS⁷) in the West Mesoregion of the state of Maranhão, Brazil, especially the principle of democratic management in municipalities which institutionalized their EMS. Thereunto, the authors cover aspects and theoretical and legal matters which ground the conception of educational system and democratic management the premises that guide the creation of the EMS. In the current context characterized by the emphasis on local regulation (municipality), this study brings important contribution to the Dossier because emphasizes the key role of the EMS and the Municipal Education Council (MEC⁸) for the municipal planning process, since MEC might be the mobilizer of the dialogue process between civil society and politics, and in articulation with the municipal forums and other instruments for monitoring and social control of education. Both may contribute to the elaboration, monitoring, and evaluation of Municipal Education Plan (MEP), and consequently enable the exercise of democratic management.

REFERÊNCIAS

• BARROSO, J. O Estado, a educação e a regulação das políticas públicas. In: Educação e Sociedade Campinas: CEDES, v. 26, n. 92, 2005. p. 725-751.
• BARROSO, J. A transversalidade das regulações em educação: modelo de análise para o estudo das políticas educativas em Portugal. In: Educação e Sociedade Campinas: CEDES, v. 39, n. 145, 2018. p. 1075-1097.
• MAROY, C. Em direção a uma regulação pós-burocrática dos sistemas de ensino na Europa? In: OLIVEIRA, D. A.; DUARTE, A. M. C. (Orgs.). Políticas públicas e educação Belo Horizonte: Editora Fino Traço, 2011. p. 19-46.

• 1
  Translated by Elita de Medeiros.

• 2
  Plano Nacional de Educação - PNE.

• 3
  Plano Estadual de Educação - PEE.

• 4
  Plano Municipal de Educação - PME.

• 5
  Índice de Desenvolvimento da Educação Básica - IDEB.

• 6
  Nova Gestão Pública - NGP.

• 7
  Sistema Municipal de Educação - SME.

• 8
  Conselho Municipal de Educação - CME.

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  06 Mar 2020
• Date of issue
  2020

History

• Received
  20 Nov 2019
• Accepted
  01 Dec 2019