Tracing neoliberal discourse in school documentation. The analysis of educational projects in Barcelona state schools

Abstract

An extensive literature has been produced to interpret the transformations that have taken place in education as an expression of the expansion of neoliberal rationality in public policies. This study adopts a mixed method, combining quantitative (text mining) and qualitative approaches (computer-assisted discourse analysis), with the aim of determining/verifying/analysing the permeability of the educational projects of state secondary schools in the city of Barcelona with regard to the neoliberal educational paradigm. Taking into account the occurrence of specific node words (such as work, competition, quality, and company), the results highlight the construction of an educational discourse focused on teaching oriented towards the needs of the new labour market, thus allowing schools to become one of the institutions that contribute to shaping a new type of subject: the flexible, emotionally stable, self-enterprising person who always needs to acquire new skills to increase her ‘human capital’.