Neoliberalism, neoconservativism, and globalisation: The OECD and new images of what is ‘best’ in early childhood education

Abstract

This paper analyses the International Early Learning and Child Well-Being Study, undertaken by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in order to draw attention to the neoliberal, neoconservative, and globalising discourses which underpin the study and generate an image of what is ‘best’ in early childhood education. The theories of Michel Foucault frame the analysis, illuminating the International Early Learning and Child Well-Being Study as a technology of governance which elicits new relationships of power between teachers, children, families, governments and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and offering ways of conceiving power/knowledge relationships as productive and therefore hopeful for those who seek to resist dominant paradigms.