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Abstract
How accountability systems restrain democratic schooling
Mikkelsen, C. C. B., Willbergh, I., Elmies-Vestergren, A.
Accountability in schooling originated a hundred years ago in the United States (Whitehead, 1929/1967) and is based on the Anglo-American educational concepts of schooling, teaching and learning (Gundem & Hopmann, 1998). The European tradition of Bildung-centered general didactics, founded on the tradition of pedagogy, represents an alternative view of schooling, teaching and learning, compared to the accountability-perspective. Education for democracy is a central goal in Bildung-centered general didactics.
This paper will apply a Bildung-centered general didactic perspective with the aim to discuss the implications of accountability systems on education for democracy. We ask: How does accountability governance systems challenge education for democracy from a Bildung-centered general didactic perspective?
This question is answered by presenting an analysis of accountability-critical articles from the period 2000-2024, using the general didactic perspective on education for democracy as an analytical lens. The core data of the study is 170 peer-reviewed journal articles in international journals. The method of the study is searching for accountability-critical studies in Academic Search Complete, snowballing in relevant research journals and thematic analysis (Alvesson & Sköldberg, 2018). The thematic analysis is conducted inductively and then the challenges are analyzed from a perspective of democracy and Nordic general didactic.
The concept of accountability is in this paper defined broadly as governance systems based on standards-based evaluation and student outcomes (Hopmann, 2003). Educational researchers have published overview-studies addressing the weaknesses of the accountability system of school governance (Granger, 2008; Jones et al., 2017; Sahlberg, 2010; Slater & Griggs, 2015; Zhao, 2020). As Slater and Griggs (2015) explain is the direction of
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accountability changed, so that accountability flows from educational stakeholders to centralized institutions. This means that neoliberal schooling is at its core an ontological struggle over subjectivity. Hence, it is a shift from a democratic social institution, accountable to the collectives of subjects of compulsory schooling given power though education, to a neoliberal reform that holds students and teachers accountable to corporate state mandates (Slater & Griggs, 2015).
The primary dividing line among democratic traditions lies between the liberal perspectives, emphasizing individual freedom and self-determination, and republican perspectives, emphasizing community, obligation and the common good (Solhaug, 2021). Our understanding of education for democracy is based on Klafkis (1991/2001) educational aims self-determination, co-determination and solidarity, which, through the imbedded ideas of individual freedom and responsibility for others, encompass parts of both liberal and republican ideals (Elmies-Vestergren, 2025). In this Bildung-centered general didactic perspective (Klafki, 1991/2001; Willbergh, 2021) individual autonomy is central, translated into teaching practice through teachers’ and students’ collective interpretation of subject matter content in teaching, differing from the outcome-focus of accountability.
We find that the main problems of accountability in education is: the de-professionalization of teachers, an undermining of student’s subjectivity, a narrowing of curricula and reinforced systematic inequality, which all are connected to and is undermining democratic education. We will contend that, within a Nordic context, the concepts of autonomy and community are uniquely challenged, which may also hold international significance.
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Elmies-Vestergren, A. (2025). Frigjøring eller umyndiggjøring: Et kritisk perspektiv på læreplanens konsept om demokratisk deltakelse i skolen. Nordisk tidsskrift for pedagogikk og kritikk, 11(1), 3–20. http://doi.org/10.23865/ntpk.v11.6481
Granger, D. A. (2008). No Child Left Behind and the Spectacle of Failing Schools: The Mythology of Contemporary School Reform. Educational Studies: Journal of the American Educational Studies Association, 43(3), 206-228. doi:10.1080/00131940802117654
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Hopmann, S. T. (2003). On the Evaluation of Curriculum Reforms. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 35(4), 459. Retrieved from http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/00220270305520
Jones, K. L., Tymms, P., Kemethofer, D., O'Hara, J., McNamara, G., Huber, S., . . . Greger, D. (2017). The unintended consequences of school inspection: the prevalence of inspection side-effects in Austria, the Czech Republic, England, Ireland, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Switzerland. Oxford Review of Education, 43(6), 805-822. doi:10.1080/03054985.2017.1352499
Klafki, W. (1991/2001). Dannelsesteori og didaktik - nye studier (B. Christensen, Trans. 2nd ed.). Århus: Forlaget Klim.
Sahlberg, P. (2010). Rethinking accountability in a knowledge society. Journal of Educational Change, 11(1), 45-61. doi:10.1007/s10833-008-9098-2
Slater, G. B., & Griggs, C. B. (2015). Standardization and Subjection: An Autonomist Critique of Neoliberal School Reform. The Review of education/pedagogy/cultural studies, 37(5), 438-459. doi:10.1080/10714413.2015.1091259
Solhaug, T. (2021). Skolen i demokratiet – demokratiet i skolen (2. utg.). Universitetsforlaget.
Willbergh, I. (2021). Bildung-Centered General Didactics. In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Education. doi:https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264093.013.1554
Zhao, Y. (2020). Two decades of havoc: A synthesis of criticism against PISA. Journal of Educational Change, 21, 245–266. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10833-019-09367-x
