Neo-liberal Ideas in the Processes of Reconceptualising Compulsory General Education: Certain Theoretical Moves and Practical Implications

Damijan Štefanc

Summary:  The treatise discusses paradigmatic shifts in the education field that can be connected with the growing influence of neo-liberalism and the related socio-economic processes and phenomena. It provides arguments in favour of the thesis that the neo-liberal logic in the education fi eld, among other things, manifests itself in the belief that it is necessary for the school to efficiently achieve its goal to thoroughly reconceptualise both the structure and the contents of the curriculum as well as the model of school organisation and management. At the curricular level, it is thus necessary to ensure that students as future workers and providers of their ’services’ in the labour market gain the appropriate knowledge, skills and personal characteristics, directly reflecting labour needs; while at the level of school organisation and management it is necessary to implement market mechanisms, primarily to establish a financing system, forcing schools to allocate funds as efficiently as possible and to be competitive in the education market. The last part of the treatise shows that the described neo-liberal logic, following the political discourse that is establishing itself in the European political arena, has directly entered into the processes of reforming Slovenian primary school plans and can also be identified in the audited goals of primary school education as defined in Article 2 of the Primary School Act.