Oscillating between the techniques of discipline and self: how Chinese policy papers on the digitalization of education subjectivize educators and the educated

Abstract

This article investigates from the WPR approach how educational digitalization is discursively constructed in China by analysing how policy papers construct different kinds of subject positions for educators and the educated. The paper identifies non-coherences at two levels. First, digital technology is alternatively profiled as a solution and as a cause of problems. Second, the subjectivities ascribed to educational actors oscillate between opposing poles. Students are expected to be creative, critical thinkers and they are required to leave crucial decisions over what to learn to digital tools. Teachers are seen as deserving technological support in the handling of countless tasks, and they are presented as objects of distrust. Parents are portrayed as deficient beings in need of re-education and as influential players entitled to monitor students and teachers. This article reveals a particular Chinese style of governance which encourages self-management and imposes disciplinary techniques.