Equity: Policy rhetoric or a matter of meaning of knowledge? Towards a framework for tracing the 'efficiency-equity' doctrine in curriculum documents

Abstract

In this article, the focus is on exploring the perspective of equity in curriculum. From a background of understanding curriculum as embedded in wider transnational policy movements, in this article the author suggests a framework for exploring the trajectories between equity policy and different types of curricula with implications for what counts as knowledge, drawing on the capabilities approach developed by Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum. The analysis highlights the instrumental, intrinsic and positional values in terms of actual functionings, expanding the individual's set of capabilities and a pluralistic learning environment. The results suggest that the technical form of the curriculum can have determining effects on the meaning of knowledge acquisition and that the capabilities approach offers an important frame of analysis for understanding how different aspects of equity are included or excluded in curriculum.