Who drives the drivers? Technology as ideology of global educational reform

This chapter begins by clarifying the use of the term “neoliberal patterns of governance”. It discusses the notion of governmentality as a powerful driver of neoliberalism, in creating so‐called “self‐managed” subjects. The chapter draws attention to a curious contradiction in this logic. It demonstrates how policy texts, that appear to bring new ideas and forms of knowledge, simply reinforce an ongoing and alarming tendency to drive out human characteristics. With reference to a corpus‐based Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), the chapter reveals powerful ideological underpinnings of technological references in global higher education (HE) policy documents. It shows the grounding of these texts in particular epistemological assumptions, and reveals how these translate into concrete policies. The chapter explores further routes through the question of “who drives the drivers?” It seeks to intervene subversively at several levels into the current discourse of global educational reform.