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The Power of Economic Textbooks. A Discourse Analysis

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Abstract

By conducting a discourse analysis (SKAD) in the field of academic economics textbooks, this paper aims at reconstructing frames and identity options offered to undergraduate students relating to the questions ‘Why study economics?’ and ‘Who do I become by studying economics?’. The analysis showed three major frames and respective identity offerings, all of which are contextualized theoretically, with prominent reference to the Foucauldian reflection of the science of Political Economy. Surprisingly, none of them encourages the student to think critically, as could have been expected in a pedagogical context. Taken together, economics textbooks appear as a “total structure of actions brought to bear upon possible action” (Foucault), therefore, as a genuine example of Foucauldian power structures.
Lukas Bäuerle
The Power of Economic
Textbooks
A Discourse Analysis
Working Paper Serie, Institut für Ökonomie und Institut für Philosophie
Nr. Ök-52
07 2019
Cusanus Hochschule | Postfach 1146 | 54461 Bernkastel-Kues | www.cusanus-
hochschule.de
WORKING PAPERS
1
The Power of Economic Textbooks
A Discourse Analysis
Lukas Bäuerle
Juli 2019
Abstract
By conducting a discourse analysis (SKAD) in the field of academic economics
textbooks, this paper aims at reconstructing frames and identity options offered to
undergraduate students relating to the questions ‘Why study economics?’ and
‘Who do I become by studying economics?’. The analysis showed three major
frames and respective identity offerings, all of which are contextualized
theoretically, with prominent reference to the Foucauldian reflection of the
science of Political Economy. Surprisingly, none of them encourages the student to
think critically, as could have been expected in a pedagogical context. Taken
together, economics textbooks appear as a “total structure of actions brought to
bear upon possible action” (Foucault), therefore, as a genuine example of
Foucauldian power structures.
Keywords: Economic education, textbook economics, discourse analysis, SKAD,
Foucault, subjectivation
JEL categories: A11, A14, A20, A22
1
1 Introduction
According to Gregory Mankiw, Mark Taylor and other important textbook authors
in economics any economic question can be subsumed under one of the following
questions: (a) what is being produced, (b) how, (c) for whom (Mankiw/Taylor 2014,
1; Samuelson/Nordhaus 2010, 7–8; Schiller 2008, 2, 12). Irrespective of the further
elaboration upon these key economic problems it seems remarkable that the ‘why’
of economic production is ignored within this set of questions. Hence, the specific
meaning1 of economic production has to remain disregarded in the mentioned
textbook literature.
Against this background it becomes plausible that economic science does not
foster a reflection upon its own existence and meaning neither. At least in the
context of their higher education, future economists do typically not become
confronted with reflexive subjects, such as the philosophy, history or methodology
of their discipline. That is to say that although students become highly involved
with the curriculums’ requirements, the reason and deeper meaning of these
requirements remains unquestioned. This void certainly leaves open self-reflexive
questions concerning the identity of future economists themselves as well. In other
words: the question ‘why study economics’ bears a strong connection to a second
question ‘who do I become by studying economics’ and both typically remain
untouched?
This paper aims at making sense of economics, concentrating on economic
education and more specifically on economics textbooks. As will be shown, the
disciplines’ most important textbooks do contain answers to both questions –
although in most cases only posed implicitly and generally without any further
elaborations. The explication of these answers is the main task of this paper. I did
not ask for possible meanings and identity offerings but rather collect, typify and
elaborate upon fragments of economics textbook literature that correspond to the
questions posed.
To this end I worked with means of the sociology of knowledge approach to
discourse (SKAD) (Keller 2005, 2011a, 2011b). The specific subjects of analysis were
(1) fundamental frames (Deutungsmuster) of economics textbooks relating to the
question ‘why study economics?’ and furthermore (2) subject positions or identity
offerings that bear answers to the question of ‘who do I become by studying
economics?’. By focusing on the deep layers producing meaning in the economics
textbooks discourse I strike up with sociology of knowledge and linguistic research
of economics (see a review of the literature in Maeße 2013, chap. 4). Pioneering
1 I am using the term meaning as a relational category that refers to something of which a subject
needs to be part of in order to successfully relate to something she intends to understand. From the
former ‘something’ do not only stem contents and forms, but also the ends of the latter
‘something’. The ‘being-part-of’ is realized not only consciously, but also unconsciously,
performatively and finally existentially (Wrana 2015).
2
but rare contributions to a discourse analysis of economics textbook literature do
exist with Klamer (1990), Pahl (2011) and Zuidhof (2014).2 None of them elaborated
upon the two central questions of this paper.
The analysis showed that the textbook discourse offers three different rationales in
order to cope with the disciplines’ meaning, all of them bringing along subject
positions, offering concepts to the students to identify with. Every frame and
identity offering could be found in at least three of the overall eight cases taken
into account. Alongside a scientifically orientated frame centered around the term
‘truth’ (chapter 3), there could also be reconstructed a second frame focusing on
the pecuniary return of studying economics (chapter 4). A last frame offers a sense
of self-empowerment for the student, integrating the former cases to a coherent
and obligatory identity option (chapter 5). After having reconstructed frames and
identity offerings from the empirical material I will contextualize each of them
theoretically. In the beginning I will sketch out the economics textbook discourse
and the dimensions of the analysis.
2 The economics textbook discourse
Academic economic education reveals an enormous degree of standardization in
form and content across institutional and national borders (Graupe 2013, 143 f.;
Beckenbach et al. 2016, chap. 7.3 & 7.5). Predominant and prominent example of
this process is the international standardization of economics textbooks (Smith
2000, 42 ff.). Regarding content, economics textbooks almost exclusively introduce
students to a fixed and narrow corpus of theoretical and methodological
considerations, mostly identified with neoclassical theory (Rebhan 2017; Fullbrook
2009, 18 f.). Hence, the textbook discourse does normally not contain any discourse
coalitions insofar as it presents itself as a univocal discourse lacking any opposition.
Furthermore, the structural and didactical design of economics textbooks rarely
differ from one another (Smith 2000, 42ff.). Partly, this aspect can be linked to the
fact that the genre of economics textbooks was developed around the ‘archetype’
of Paul A. Samuelson’s Economics (first published in 1948) during the course of the
second half of the 20th century (Klamer 1990, 130; Gottesman/Ramrattan/Szenberg
2005, 98, 101; Stiglitz 1988, 172f.). Following its subsequent translation into over
40 languages (Skousen 1997, 137) it became the “international benchmark of
macro- and microeconomics” (Samuelson/Nordhaus 2007; transl. L.B.). Concerning
market shares, it was topped by Campbell McConnells’ Economics during the 1970s
(Elzinga 1992, 874). A third and today predominant textbook author is Gregory
Mankiw (2015: Principles of Economics3). By 2012 the textbooks by McConnell (now
publishing together with Stanley Brue and Sean Flynn) and Mankiw together held
40% of the market share for English language introductory economics textbook
2 Textbooks as such are common subjects to discourse analytical research (see Olson 1980; Klerides
2010; Shardakova/Pavlenko 2004).
3 In my analysis I also considered Mankiw/Taylor (2014): Economics. Both textbooks rarely differ.
3
literature (Lopus/Paringer 2012, 298). For these reasons the three textbooks may
qualify as ‘key documents’ within the discourse of introductory economics
textbooks.4 Based on the criterions of market shares (ibid.), number of editions and
sales probability on amazon.com (Zuidhof 2014, 159) the following five textbooks
could also be identified as dominant: Miller (2011): Economics Today; Schiller
(2010): The Economy Today; Gwartney et al. (2014): Economics: Private and Public
Choice; Krugman/Wells (2015): Economics and Frank/Bernanke/Johnston (2013):
Principles of Economics.
Two aspects of the economics textbooks discourse shall be pointed out here
regarding its context and reach: firstly it can be identified as a specialized scientific
discourse that not only addresses beginners but furthermore lays out a
paradigmatic ground on which subsequent levels of training and finally the
discipline as a whole relies on. In the context of a typical Kuhnian ‘textbook
science’, the economics textbooks discourse can be attributed a fundamental
function for the disciplines’ coherent development (Bäuerle 2017). So while
freshmen students can be called its narrow academic audience, the discipline as a
whole can be called as the discourses’ wider academic audience.
On the other hand it can be labelled a semi-public if not public discourse insofar as it
not only addresses future or present economists, but a wide range of all kinds of
academics. Pahl (2011, 369) estimates the ratio of economics and other-than-
economics students in academic US introductory economics courses by 2:100. In
Germany, at least 16,3% of the 2.8 million students enrolled in higher education
should have heard and been examined in fundamental economics lectures
(estimation based on Statistisches Bundesamt 2017, 14, 327). Hence, the discourse
reaches an audience far beyond the discipline’s borders. This also accounts for
economics graduates, who exert a significant impact on non-scientific discourses,
e.g. in politics or media (Christensen 2017). Taken together, the reach of
fundamentals in economics clearly goes beyond the disciplines’ borders, insofar as
“theoretical ideas or models, expert interpretations of reality respectively seep
into common knowledge of individuals, thereby shaping their actions more or less
pragmatically” (Keller 2011a, 183; transl. L.B.). The knowledge resources of this
highly standardized and institutionalized discourse can be assumed at least in
present public economy-related discourses. In this sense, the textbook can be
labelled as public mass media.
Despite this reach of the economics textbook discourse, the modes and means of
its production remain widely uncertain. This can partly be explained by referring to
the powerful position of only four major remaining publishers that do not publish
any detailed information regarding the history and production of their textbooks.5
Furthermore, economics textbooks research so far mostly concentrates on its
4 With ‘introductory textbooks’ I mean those used in basic modules commonly termed as ‘Econ101’.
5 In 1992 there were 20 active publishers operating in the economics textbooks market
(Lopus/Paringer 2012, 297 f.). The four remaining are McGraw-Hill Irvin, Pearson Education, Cengage
Learning und Worth.
4
contents (e.g. Aslanbeigui/Naples 1996; van Treeck/Urban 2016), thereby leaving
(political, institutional or economical) questions of discourse production uncovered.
Recent network analysis (Giraud 2014) and a brief review of the acknowledgements
of the textbook literature mentioned indicate that this discourse is not being
established merely by textbook authors alone, but by a group of actors from within
and outside the academic sphere. This paper continues to ignore the “personnel of
discourse production” (Keller 2013, 38; transl. L.B.) and its “institutional
infrastructures” (ibid.) but focuses on rarely analysed frames, that relate to either
of the central questions of this discourse analysis: ‘Why study economics?’ and
‘Who do I become by studying economics?’. These questions were addressed
towards the introductory chapters6 of the selected textbooks.
A frame is a discursive element that “depicts fundamental meaning and action-
generating schemata, which are circulated through discourses and make it possible
to understand what a phenomenon is all about” (Keller 2011b, 57). The German
term Deutungsmuster clearly points out that frames refer to typical and
constitutive layers of a discourse:
“The concept of Deutungsmuster refers to typified clusters of disparate elements of
meaning production, the core configuration of signs, symbols, sentences and
utterances which create a coherent ensemble of meaning” (Keller 2005, n.p.).
The analysis pursued in this article at first focused on the frame giving meaning to
the entire context of economics textbooks – hence, economics education – as such.
Why would this study program be of any interest? What do the textbooks promise
their readers in terms of meaningful ends of studying them? Secondly, the analysis
aimed at reconstructing subject positions or identity offerings presented to
textbook readers. They
“depict positioning processes and ‘patterns of subjectivation’ which are generated in
discourses and which refer to (fields of) addressees. Technologies of the self are
understood as exemplary elaborated, applicable and available instructions for
subjectivation” (Keller 2011b, 55).
Hence, identity offerings may introduce and guide a transformation of self-
understanding of the addressees. As will be shown, frames and identity offerings
bear a close relationship within this sample: with every frame there goes along a
certain subject position that corresponds to a meaningful study of economics. The
link between frames and identity offerings therefore is always being elaborated
conjunctively.
6 By ‘introductory chapters’ I mean the preface, chapter 1 and if thematically relevant also
chapter 2.
5
3 First frame: Learn the truth!
Why study economics? In the seventh Edition of his Principles of Economics Gregory
Mankiw devotes the entire preface to this question of a possible meaning of
studying the subject:
“Why should you, as a student at the beginning of the 21st century, embark on the
study of economics? There are three reasons.
The first reason to study economics is that it will help you understand the world in which
you live. […] The second reason to study economics is that it will make you a more
astute participant in the economy. […] The third reason to study economics is that it will
give you a better understanding of both the potential and the limits of economic policy.
Economic questions are always on the minds of policymakers in mayors’ offices, governors’
mansions, and the White House. […]
Thus, the principles of economics can be applied in many of life’s situation. Whether the
future finds you reading the newspaper, running a business, or sitting in the Oval
Office, you will be glad that you studied economics” (Mankiw 2015, xi; italics L.B.).
The discussion of ‘economics principles’ is being introduced as inevitable for
someone (1) who wants to understand ‘the world’, (2) for an active participant of
the economy and (3) finally for a policymaker in this (economic) world. Although
Mankiw introduces a plurality of identities to which the study of economics seems
suitable,7 he limits the reason for this manifold suitability to only one: “principles of
economics can be applied in many of life’s situation” (ibid.). In other words,
‘principles of economics’ take effect on any level of human engagement. Therefore
knowing them will be relevant for any participant of society irrespective of her
special purpose.
Samuelson/Nordhaus consistently and most clearly limit the reasons to engage
with their textbook to only one:
“as we have come to realize, there is one overriding reason to learn the basic lessons of
economics: All your life from cradle to grave and beyond8you will run up against the
brutal truths of economics” (Samuelson/Nordhaus 2010, 3).
And furthermore:
“Of course, studying economics will not make you a genius. But without economics the
dice of life are loaded against you” (ibid.).
Irrespective of time and space ‘brutal truths of economics’ constitute the inevitable
foundation of human action. In the most distinctive situations of their lives, people
find themselves confronted with a sphere of truths they can ignore or forget but
7 As remains to be shown, Mankiw here ‘in a nutshell’ introduces all of the reconstructed frames and
identity offerings. See chapter 6 for possible ways of synthesizing them.
8 In the German version there is no translation of the ‘beyond’ (see Samuelson/Nordhaus 2007, 17).
From a philosophical point of view the ‘beyond’ addresses the question of the scope of economic
theory. When attributing economic laws metaphysical qualities these laws rule in any possible ontic
spheres, including the forms of existence beyond the grave. See Brodbeck 2011 [2000] for a
recapitulation of the ontological foundations of economic thought. See Agamben 2014 [2007] and
Nelson 2001 for religious tendencies in economic thought.
6
which under any circumstances will never cease to exist. Paralleled by the natural
laws known to natural scientists, the social domain is controlled by economic laws
known to the economist:
Most of us make sensible decisions most of the time, without being consciously aware
that we are weighing costs and benefits, just as most people ride a bike without being
consciously aware of what keeps them from falling. Through trial and error, we
gradually learn what kinds of choices tend to work best in different contexts, just as
bicycle riders internalize the relevant laws of physics, usually without being conscious
of them” (Frank/Bernanke/Johnston 2013, 7).
Any decision we take in life is in fact a calculation of costs and benefits. The one
knowing the laws that govern these calculations will therefore have a significant
advantage in tackling daily life. By referring to another natural science (biology) a
few pages later Frank/Bernanke/Johnston introduce a specific subject that
possesses this kind of knowledge about the fundamental aspects of ‘human
existence’:
“Learning a few simple economic principles [...] enables us to see the mundane details
of ordinary human existence in a new light. Whereas the uninitiated often fail even to
notice these details, the economic naturalist not only sees them, but becomes actively
engaged in the attempt to understand them” (ibid., 17).
The ‘economic naturalist’ is a figure that knows about economic principles or at
least tries to ‘understand’ them. This figure is to be sharply contrasted to the
‘uninitiated’, who is not able to notice the ‘mundane details of human existence’.
Along with the introduction of a sphere of economic laws or principles, all of the
cited textbooks introduce specific subject positions that correspond to these laws.
The genuine feature of these figures consists in knowing economic laws or
principles. As seen in the last quotation this knowledge constitutes a figure or even
group: it is the economist or the discipline of economics that govern and preserve
the specific type of knowledge. This figure and group is, as in this case, often
sharply separated from the non-knowers, the ‘uninitiated’. In obtaining the decisive
knowledge and thereby becoming an economist consists the first meaning of
studying economics.
In his lectures on the ‘Birth of Biopolitics’ (1978-79), Michel Foucault carved out
that a hidden world of laws governing human action served as the ultimate
legitimizing foundation of the a science called ‘political economy’. In early stages of
this new science in late 18th century, economists suggested themselves as advisers
to and constrainers of governments. Their actions and decisions, the former
claimed, were limited by laws, binding and undeceivable in character. Upon these
laws economists developed a field of knowledge that – from then on – came to be
the primary domain and resource of economic science:
“There is a nature specific to this governmental action itself and this is what political
economy will study. […] It is the other face of something whose visible face, visible for
the governors, is their own action. Their action has an underside, or rather, it has
another face, and this other face of governmentality, its specific necessity, is precisely
what political economy studies. […] Thus, the économistes explain, the movement of
population to where wages are highest, for example, is a law of nature; it is a law of
7
nature that customs duty protecting the high price of the means of subsistence will
inevitably entail something like dearth” (Foucault 2010b [1978-79], 15-16).
Political Economy knows a second sphere behind or underneath anything called
‘governmental action’ by which the latter is determined. One cannot see or touch
this second sphere, but one can grasp it by the means and tools developed by
economic scientists. In being able to grasp economic truth, economists were soon
endowed with the capacity to distinguish right from wrong and most precisely:
right action from wrong action; ‘right action’ meaning that it corresponded to the
fundamental laws it was bound up to (ibid.). Hence, truth became the central
criterion of governmental action and the specific domain where this truth was
continuously uncovered was the science of Political Economy.
Having developed to a state of textbook science, present economics still lives
within this powerful and long lasting self-conception. Today not only governments
are offered economic knowledge and advice but, according to textbook authors,
anyone seeking a fundamental understanding of human action can approach the
laws of economics:
“We hope you will find that, in addition to being useful, economics is even a fascinating
field. Generations of students, often to their surprise, have discovered how stimulating
it is to look beneath the surface and understand the fundamental laws of economics”
(Samuelson/Nordhaus 2010, 3; italics L.B.).
The specific meaning of economic education according to this frame finds its
ground in the existence of economic laws that govern daily human action. Insofar it
is a strong classificatory frame that discursively produces a sphere of phenomena.
It profoundly changes the experience (and research) of reality: any daily experience
is now predominated by a causal, law-like reason, which is valid independently from
space and time (in China or the US, yesterday or tomorrow).
Economists have discovered and studied these laws in a tradition lasting 250 years.
The distilled core of this alleged knowledge is now being presented to students of
the subject in the form of textbooks. Studying the textbook and the subject is
meaningful since it promises insights in this knowledge. In the end, only ‘the
knowing’ will be able to live a conscious and truthful life. And ‘the knowing’ are
identified with the economists: only (!) they possess this knowledge, whose
acquisition marks the target of economic education. ‘Knowing the truth about
human existence’ therefore becomes the first dominant motivation and frame of
studying economics.
8
4 Second frame: Capitalize your education!
The second frame does not refer merely to the contents of economics textbooks,
but is also mirrored in their forms (their composition, design, etc.). In this respect it
demonstrates a structural familiarity with other formal elements of contemporary
economic education (curricular design, assessment modalities, etc.). In the
following section, this dual character of the frame (content and form) will be
elaborated upon by referring to explicit textbook quotes (and not, for example, by
means of a structural analysis of the considered textbooks). To better understand
the institutional roots of formal elements, this section also contains an excursus
about the Bologna reform and its intellectual underpinning: human capital theory.
The textbook of Gwartney et al. contains a separate chapter ‘Economics as a career’
that nourishes the expectation of an annual income between 75.000 and 90.000
US-$ for economics graduates (Gwartney et al. 2006, 2; see also Miller 2012, 2.).
According to this chapter, studying economics becomes meaningful due to its
potentially high reimbursement measured in monetary income. The twin thought
to this income orientated perspective is more frequently found in textbooks:
studying economics prevents from negative income, that is costs. Schiller
introduces this thought by closely referring to the daily decisions (and its
omnipresent opportunity costs) of students:
“Even reading this book is costly. That cost is not measured in dollars and cents. The
true (economic) cost is, instead, measured in terms of some alternative activity. What
would you like to be doing right now? The more time you spend reading this book, the
less time you have available for that alternative use of your time. The opportunity cost
of reading this text is the best alternative use of your scarce time. […] Hopefully, the
benefits you get from studying will outweigh that cost. Otherwise this wouldn’t be the
best way to use your scarce time” (Schiller 2008, 6).
According to Schiller, in educational affairs, as well as in any other affairs, there
exists the possibility to decide rationally9 and unambiguously. This stems from the
fact, that educational decisions are governed by the same laws and truths that
govern any other activity. Since rational decisions are possible, and the economics
curriculum is offering tools to thoughtfully realize such decisions, studying the
subject will yield its payoff. Even more than that: anyone not applying economic
tools and knowledge properly will not be using her time in ‘the best way’. Hence,
maximizing behavior is being elevated to the rank of a norm. According to this
frame, the meaning of studying economics does not exhaust itself in the
apprehension or understanding of economic knowledge, but in its profitable
application. What is true for the engineering sciences is also true for economics: if
the world is governed by (economic) laws that can’t be changed in space and time,
one can at least work with them profitably.
9 When talking about “economic” or “rational” thought, decision-making or action in the following I
always mean Becker’s narrow definition: the application of a maximizing calculus on the basis of
ever fixed preferences in a competitive market context (Becker 1978 [1976], 4 f.). Certainly, this is a
highly selective understanding of the economy and rationality from an intradisciplinary (Davis 2011)
as well as interdisciplinary (Healy 2017) perspective.
9
But reading the textbook is not only profitable due to the valuable knowledge
offered by it. In a broader sense it is profitable because textbooks themselves had
been designed according to maximizing principles in the first place:
“Our textbook grew out of our conviction that students will learn far more if we
attempt to cover much less. Our basic premise is that a small number of basic principles
do most of the heavy lifting in economics, and that if we focus narrowly and repeatedly
on those principles, students can actually master them in just a single semester”
(Frank/Bernanke/Johnston 2013, vii).
The textbook of Frank/Bernanke/Johnston is efficient because it sticks to the most
important lessons, therefore being able to convey the essential in less time. In this
optimized form of textbook design we find a central aspect of the frame discussed
in this chapter. I will focus in this aspect now in further detail before returning to
the textbooks contents only at the end of the chapter.
The field of economic education is being structured by a specific economic
reasoning way beyond the contents of economics textbooks. In the first place, the
production process of textbooks itself can be described as efficient or ‘rational’ in
the mentioned sense (Pinto 2007, 108 ff.; Macgilchrist 2015). Furthermore, the
transfer of their knowledge is being supported by the supply of ready-to-use slide
sets that do not have to be developed by the teachers, therefore gaining valuable
time for research:
“after a while, the marginal cost of preparing to teach a traditional principles class
drops toward zero while the marginal cost of preparing to teach a social issues course
remains relatively high” (Grimes 2009, 98; cited in Kapeller/Ötsch 2010, 19).
Actually, only those courses are being offered by departments that cost less time in
preparation. The economic order of the field also applies to its assessment
modalities. The reason why economic education traditionally sticks to written
exams is being found in ‘cost considerations’: “Multiple-choice tests are a staple of
assessment in economics classes, especially in large enrolment introductory
classes, where they are nearly mandated by cost considerations” (Becker 2000,
116). Consequentially, the cost factor – the magnitude of introductory courses
had itself been determined efficiently in the first place:
“How many students are in your introductory economics class? Some classes have just
20 or so. Others average 35, 100, or 200 students. At some schools, introductory
economics classes may have as many as 2,000 students. What size is best? If cost were
no object, the best size might be a single student. [...] Why, then, do so many
introductory classes still have hundreds of students? The simple reason is that costs do
matter. [...] In choosing what size introductory economics course to offer, then,
university administrators confront a classic economic trade-off”
(Frank/Bernanke/Johnston 2013, 3f.).
Overall, students of economics learn that the educational setting they live and
study in is being designed by the very same principles they get to know about in
economics lectures. The study contents are being taught to the audience by
referring to their own experiences in the educational context. The mode of
discursive production, hence, conforms to the experiences made within the
discursive setting and finally to the discursive contents. Forms and contents of
10
economic education seem identical in character. Even more than that: the
experiences of its form seem to proof the legitimacy of its contents.
The reference to an efficient mode of discursive production underlines that the
frame ‘Capitalize your education!’ does not only apply to the students but to all
participants of the economics textbooks discourse. In this sense, the international
market for textbooks has to be looked upon as a tremendously profitable field.
Nasar (1995) claims, that alone on the US-American market there are being realized
sales revenues of ca. 50 mio. US-$. Textbook authors such as Joseph Stiglitz
(350.000 US-$) or Gregory Mankiw (1.4 Mio. US-$) were paid remarkable sums in
advance by their publishers (ibid.). Let alone the textbook by McConnell/Brue listed
150.000 sold books from 1962 to 1995 (ibid., numbers and revenues of
international editions not included). Taking into account these numbers, economic
education appears as a tremendously and primarily profitable field. I now want to
consider the intellectual roots of this certain understanding of education, its means
and ends. Starting with a brief contextualization for the European case, the rest of
the chapter will show that the frame ‘Capitalize your education’ nowadays by far
exceeds the borders of economic education.
The educational situation for European universities has changed dramatically
following the joint signing of the Bologna Declaration by 29 educational ministers
in 1999. Coming from a heterogeneous educational landscape marked by different
degrees and educational cultures, a far-reaching educational reform should bring
about a harmonization in the span of only little more than a decade (cf. European
Ministers of Education 1999). The Bologna Reform literally takes effect by a change
of educational forms (although educational contents might have changed in the
course of it realization, of course). At its core, the reform established the end of
economic profitability of (higher) education. Stemming from this end, the European
Higher Education Area (EHEA), its institutions and degrees were designed and
remodelled in an entrepreneurial manner: via a standardized systematization and
measurement of study programs, educational institutions and areas. In order to be
manageable in a rational and economical way, it was obligatory to bring the
educational systems to terms and numbers. Standardizations of all kind – from
ECTS points to salary categories were cast upon the heterogeneous educational
systems in Europe, aiming at their comparability and economic manageability. This
specific remodelling of the educational sphere can be termed its economization.10
The theoretical key term governing this process implicitly and explicitly is human
capital. Its recapitulation shall now help us not only to understand the frame of the
Bologna Reform, but also the frame of economics textbooks highlighted in this
section.
The term ‘human capital’ arises in the late 1950s in the newly emerging field of
‘economics of education’. It was mainly developed by economists from the
University of Chicago and as such has to be subsumed under the imperial efforts of
10 For an overview see Spring 2015 as well as Liesner 2014; see also Maeße 2010.
11
the Chicago School of Economics, which aimed at expanding standard economic
reasoning to all sorts of intellectual and actual domains:
“economics is an imperial science: it has been aggressive in addressing central problems
in a considerable number of neighboring social disciplines, and without any invitations”
(Stigler 1984, 311).
The concept of ‘human capital’ can be traced back to an article written by Jacob
Mincer (1958) (Foucault 2010b [1978-9], 235 fn. 22). From there on, it was further
being developed to the ‘human capital theory’ by Theodore Schultz and Gary
Becker. These three Chicago economists are therefore considered as the founding
fathers of human capital theory.
Their starting point was the statement that the economic term ‘labour’ was
underdeveloped, since it was, in their view, largely misunderstood from the
beginning of classical economics on in late 18th century. From then on, economists
did consider labour as a decisive factor in the production of wealth but only
operated with it in technical terms (hours of labour) and generally underrated it in
comparison with non-human sorts of capital (land and physical capital) (Schultz
1959, 110). Beginning with Adam Smith, the Chicago economists claimed, this
omission was handed on to Marx and the Keynesian tradition and was primarily
rooting in an abbreviated understanding of capital, that only considered such
factors that ware offered for sale on markets (ibid., 111). Therefore Schultz et al.
positioned themselves behind the capital definition brought about by Irving Fisher
in 1906. According to his capital theory, anything being able to yield future income
should be called and considered as ‘capital’ (Foucault 2010b [1978-9], 224).
The intellectual shortcomings of former economists led to the negligence of gross
parts of the determinants of individual and social wealth. Especially the factor
‘labour’ should not be limited to a mere variable of working hour. Actually,
individuals as well as firms and governments continuously invest in the quality of
this factor, thereby increasing its productivity. (Schultz 1960, 571). Precisely these
investments should be called ‘investments in human capital’. The ways of investing
in human capital are manifold: through education, health and mobility or flexibility
as well as the opportunity costs of education (missed income) and on-the-job-
training people invest in the quality of labour, so far without being considered
statistically and theoretically by economists (Schultz 1961, 1). Even in his first
articles, Schultz estimates the dimension of this so far unknown source of wealth
to the same as non-human forms of capital (ibid., 12). According to the Economics of
Education, man himself was overlooked in his ‘capitalness‘.
Considering individuals as carrier and caretaker of their proper capital led to
serious shifts in perspective. Primarily, the classical archetypes of capital owner on
the one hand and labourer on the other became obsolete:
“Laborers have become capitalists not from a diffusion of the ownership of corporation
stocks, as folklore would have it, but from the acquisition of knowledge and skill that
have economic value” (ibid., 3.).
12
From now on, labourers could be seen as their own entrepreneurs, continuously
optimizing the process of capital increase by means of a wide range of daily
decisions: Do I opt for this or that study program? Does a bachelors’ degree actually
yield more income than a job training? Does it outweigh the costs to educate our
child bilingually? Any decision individuals face on a daily basis could now, according
to the human capital theorist be brought down to only one single question: does
the decision outcome yield an increase in income?11 Thereby, they implicitly state
this one norm and imperative: ‘Capitalize your education!’.
Human capital theory subsumes any educational consideration under the end of
economic profitability. According to this end, education aims at increasing income.
Thereby the field of pedagogy is implicitly being integrated to the economic field.
Accordingly, Schultz uses the term “human investment” synonymously with the
term “education” (Schultz 1961, 4.).
What is being formulated by Chicago economists on the individual level also leads
to a reformulation of macroeconomic decisions concerning entire educational
systems. Schools and institutions of higher education are not part of educational
systems anymore, but part of an ‘economy of education’. In the light of human
capital theory, educational institutions become production facilities. Their products
are trained individuals entitled with competences (Becker 1962: 25). Like any other
product ‘qualified staff’ is assembled by a wide range of production factors:
“Ideally, we want a measure of the annual flow of the inputs employed for education.
This flow consists of the services of teachers, librarians, and school administrators, of
the annual factor costs of maintaining and operating the school plant, and of
depreciation and interest” (Schultz 1960, 577).
Certainly only those factors can be labelled ‘capital increasing’ that actually yield a
return on investment on the labour market. To put it in terms of this article:
(economic) education is only meaningful if the educational process actually leads to
increased future income. (Economic) education gains its legitimation in the
economic profitability of the acquainted competences. In the perspective of human
capital theorists, education lacking any return on investment therefore becomes
meaningless. Accordingly, ‘cultural education’ becomes considered as consumption
(and not as investment) (Schultz 1961, 4). Investments on a macroeconomic level
should rather be designed in such a way that they possibly maximize national GDP
growth. As early as 1960 Schultz considers the possibility to calculate a causal
relationship and ratio of investments in human capital and economic growth,
11 By ‘income’ it is meant the real, aggregated lifetime income. From this assumption arises the
question of an optimal lifetime that can be resolved by economic reasoning: “According to the
economic approach, therefore, most (if not all!) deaths are to some extent ‘suicides’ in the sense
that they could have been postponed if more resources had been invested in prolonging life”
(Becker 1978, 9 f.).
13
thereby allowing to forecast and rationally determine an optimal rate of
investment in education understood in the said sense (Schultz 1960, 583).12
In the meanwhile, the economics of education program in the Chicago tradition has
become a regular branch of standard economics and human capital theory
accordingly a core part of introductory economics literature.13 Krugman/Wells
describe the theory in a nutshell as follows: “Human capital is the improvement in
labour created by education and knowledge that is embodied in the workforce”
(Krugman/Wells 2015, 544; see also Frank/Bernanke/Johnston 2013, 339).
Gwartney et al. honor Gary Becker with an informational box (“outstanding
economist”) that highlights Becker’s pioneering work in human capital theorizing
(Gwartney et al. 2006, 532). Mankiw introduces the concept with direct reference
to the educational context in which the student of economics gets to know about
it:
“Education, training, and experience are less tangible than lathes, bulldozers, and
buildings, but human capital is like physical capital in many ways. Like physical capital,
human capital raises a nation's ability to produce goods and services. Also like physical
capital, human capital is a produced factor of production. Producing human capital
requires inputs in the form of teachers, libraries, and student time. Indeed, students
can be viewed as ‘workers’ who have the important job of producing the human capital
that will be used in future production” (Mankiw 2015, 530).
Students are addressed as ‘workers’ or ‘producers’ of their own capital stock, as
human capitalists. Gwartney et al. explicitly remind their students of their being
rational actors that face a cost benefit trade-off when opting for different careers
and remind them: “A rational person will attend college only if the expected future
benefits outweigh the current costs” (Gwartney et al. 2006, 532; see also
Frank/Bernanke/Johnston 2013, 510).
The reconstruction of a second frame introduced by economics textbooks led us to
a recapitulation of the structural context of contemporary higher education in
Europe. From there, we came back to the economics profession and finally to
economics textbooks by looking deeper into the theoretical background of the
Bologna reform: human capital theory. What combines all of the considered
discursive fragments is the subsumption of (economic) education under economic
ends, understood as the maximization of pecuniary pay-offs. Students of
economics get acquainted with the frame of profitable studies not just through
contents, but also by the forms of their training. Taking this correspondence of
12 Inspired by these thoughts, Chicago economists Romer and Lucas will later develop an
‘endogenous growth theory’ that focuses on the relation of investment in ‘soft’ forms of capital
such as human capital and economic growth of territorial units.
13 It is commonly referred to in the chapters concerning growth theory (McConnell/Brue/Flynn
2009, 10; Mankiw 2015, 527 ff.; Frank/Bernanke/Johnston 2013, 509 ff.; Gwartney et al. 2006, 352;
Schiller 2008, 339 ff.; Krugman/Wells 2015, chap. 24) and wage determination
(McConnell/Brue/Flynn 2009, 283 f.; Samuelson/Nordhaus 2010, 339, 353 f., 361 f.; Mankiw 2015,
chap. 19-1b; Frank/Bernanke/Johnston 2013, 339 ff.; Gwartney et al. 2006, 551 ff.; Schiller 2008,
chap. 16; Krugman/Wells 2015, 544 ff.). McConnell/Brue/Flynn (2009, 451 f.) additionally use the
concept in the context of the economics of migration and development (McConnell/Brue/Flynn
2009, chap. 39; see also Schiller 2008, 742, 749).
14
content and form seriously, the field could adequately be termed economized
economic education. The corresponding identity offering to this frame is the
‘entrepreneurial self’ (Bröckling 2016), a rational subject that uses the economic
rationale to invest in itself in order to finally capitalize these investments in terms
of money. That this rationalizing is not just a possible (and clever) way of thinking,
but actually the naturally embedded rationale of any subject is the final lesson of a
third frame.
5 Third frame: Become who you are!
Searching for the foundations of a capitalizing rationality in educational matters in
chapter 4 we ended up in the very same science we started with: economics.
Starting in the late 1950s, the economics of education research program developed
a theory of human capital that has profoundly shaped contemporary educational
contexts. From its beginning onward, the theory carries along a decisive problem
that shall finally lead to the clarification of a third frame found within the material.
The problem starts with the following early statement of human capital theorists:
“Since it [human capital; L.B.] becomes an integral part of a person, it cannot be
bought or sold or treated as property under our institutions” (Schultz 1960, 571).
An investment in this new sort of capital becomes inseparably “embedded” in a
person (Becker 1962, 9). Hence, the investment is ‘locked up’ in that person and
cannot be removed and sold again like physical capital (e.g. a machine). The power
of disposition upon the investment rests with the person invested in. Third parties
only dispose of this investment when living in a society that allows for slavery
(Schultz 1959, 110; this diagnosis is handed on in the textbook of Gwartney et al.
2006, 532). Ignoring the ethical implications of this ‘problem’, the main question for
human capital theorizing can now be stated: why should human beings invest in
other human beings (or the youth of an entire country) if the legal context of this
investment prohibits a direct disposition of it? This question is of enormous
economic or, more specifically, of entrepreneurial importance. The institutional
constellation bears a gap of control for the investor. This gap turns into a serious
risk (if he chooses not only to invest in himself). It is precisely this kind of gap a
gap or lack of control – where Foucault locates questions of power. In the following
section I want to stress upon a frame found in economics textbooks that can be
interpreted as ‘textbook examples’ of Foucauldian techniques and technologies of
power.14
According to Foucault, power is foremost a productive phenomenon. It does not
repress, exclude or censor but it establishes spaces and rituals where one can start
living in (see Foucault 1995 [1975], 194). For Foucault the most important of these
spaces is the modern subject itself. The consideration of modern power
14 I am aware of only one attempt to apply Foucauldian power analysis in the context of economics
textbooks (Zuidhof 2014).
15
phenomena for him is always constituted by the dispositif of selfhood: “Thus it is
not power, but the subject, which is the general theme of my research” (Foucault
1983, 209; 2010a [1982-3]; Rose 1998; Bröckling 2016). More specifically, Foucault’s
perspective focuses on the question of production of subjectivity (subjectivation).
As he points out, this process starts with and relies upon a true knowledge of
subjectivity: a knowledge of ones’ own truth, ones’ ‘true character’, ‘true core’,
‘true nature’, ‘true self-image’, ‘true preferences’ etc.
In chapter 3 we got to know economics as a science that presents itself as
dedicated to eternal economic laws and truths. Human action is governed by a
world of laws that human beings cannot see but which can be ‘detected’ by means
of abstract economic reasoning and tools. These truths and respective identity
options now gain a productive character: they allow for specific and directive
reference of subjects to themselves and the world around them (Foucault 1978).
Power is precisely the pre-configuration of these production processes of selfhood,
it is ‘action upon action’. An individual adopting given subject positions believes he
is developing a genuine identity. Actually she starts to govern herself on the basis
of given options. Governed by a frame given to him, the subject gains a feeling of
certainty and self-consciousness (Schäfer 2004, 153). Therein lies the specific
strength of modern power relations.
Now it is the science of Political Economy that Foucault identifies as the primary
field of knowledge that developed this kind of power relations in modern times,
simultaneously laying ground for the predominant identity offerings of modernity
(Foucault 1991 [1978], 92, 102 f.). With reference to Friedrich A. Hayek, Foucault
underlines a genuine facet of US-American (actually: Chicago) neoliberalism to have
established economic reasoning as “general style of thought, analysis and
imagination” within society (Foucault 2010b [1978-9], 219; see Hayek 1993 [1980],
70). Apart from the institutional preconditions of such claim, this development is
intellectually grounded in a severe expansion of the scope of economic thinking:
“The basis for this strategic operation is an epistemological displacement the
systematic, comprehensive expansion of the economy from a single social realm with
its own laws and instruments into a process governing all human behavior”
(Bröckling/Krasmann/Lemke 2010, 6).
Taking into account this intellectual heritage it seems plausible that common
economics textbook literature today offers a purely economic, socially and
contextually unbounded, identity offering that willingly or not bears the
16
possibility to influence its readers’ actions.15 In this specific sense, economics
textbooks can be looked at and analyzed as means of political communication.16
One precondition when aiming at governing them (gouverner) is the foundation of
a specific mindset (mentalité) within the led or governed individuals. Mankiw/Tayor
explicitly prepare their readers for such a shift of mindset:
“Many of the concepts you will come across in this book are abstract. Abstract concepts
are ones which are not concrete or real they have no tangible qualities. We will talk
about markets, efficiency, comparative advantage and equilibrium, for example, but it
is not easy to physically see these concepts. There are also some concepts that are
fundamental to the subject if you master these concepts they act as a portal which
enables you to think like an economist. Once you have mastered these concepts you
will never think in the same way again and you will never look at an issue in the same
way” (Mankiw/Taylor 2014, 17).
According to Mankiw/Taylor, the world of economic knowledge is presented in
‘abstract concepts’ that trigger the experience of passing through a ‘portal’. Going
through this portal (read: these concepts) will fundamentally change the readers’
ability to perceive the world around them. A little bit further, Mankiw/Taylor
underline that this shifting experience may if not must lead to serious conflicts
with common beliefs or experiences. This conflict is a ‘normal’ part of the learning
experience since students get to know a world that they cannot see ‘physically’. It
has to irritate them. Eventually they get in touch with the unseen world of
economic laws, governing the social, natural in character. Students here become
prepared to open themselves to this world through the acquaintance of tools of
abstract reasoning. Necessarily they need to neglect or even set aside common
sense frames for social interaction gained through life experience: “The challenge,
therefore, is to set aside that everyday understanding and think of the term or
concept as economists do” (ibid.). We find this imperative again in the textbook of
Samuelson/Nordhaus (2010, xx):
“Students enter the classroom with a wide range of backgrounds and with many
preconceptions about how the world works. Our task is not to change student's values.
Rather, we strive to help students understand enduring economic principles so that
they may better be able to apply them to make the world a better place for
themselves, their families, and their communities.”
Or in the textbook of Gwartney et al. (2006, 5):
15 In the following I will concentrate on Foucault’s works on ‘control power’ only. Nevertheless, the
adoption of his thoughts on disciplinary power regimes bear numerous links in the given field of
academic economic education. This is true for all of the techniques and technologies of disciplinary
power identified by Foucault: hierarchies, normalizing judgement and examination (see Foucault
1995 [1975], 170 ff.). By disciplinary means the act of choice between different frames and identity
offerings can slightly or significantly become channeled. For the difference between both kinds of
Foucauldian power regimes see Sternfeld 2009: chap. 4.
16 Some authors explicitly reflect their textbooks in a political context: “Let those who will write the
nation’s laws if I can write its textbooks” (Barnett/Samuelson 2007, 143). See also Mankiw: “In
making these decisions [of selecting textbook contents, L.B.], I am guided by the fact that, in
introductory economics, the typical student is not a future economist but is a future voter. I include
the topics that I believe are essential to help produce well-informed citizens” (Mankiw 2016, 170).
17
“In economics you will learn a new and powerful way of thinking that might lead you to
question some of your current views and to look at things in a different way. [...]
economic analysis provides valuable insights about how the world really works. These
insights, however, often conflict with commonly held beliefs about the way things
‘ought’ to work” (italics L.B.; see also Miller 2012, 5).
Taking seriously these textbook quotes, economic education is successful when the
student has learned to think differently, that is: to think with the abstract tools of
economists. This also means, that in order to graduate, one needs to overcome
thinking like the one who has opted for the economics curriculum in the first place.
But how do you actually think as an economist? What kind of abstraction does it
imply? And finally: what kind of subjectivity do students have to adopt in order to
see ‘how the world really works’?
Students are led to see the world through the eyes of an entrepreneurial self, a
subject position originating in the archetype of homo oeconomicus (Foucault 2010b
[1978-9], lecture 9; Bröckling 2016, xiv). Although none of the analyzed textbooks
explicitly introduces this economic anthropology, its specific rationale can be
described as the omnipresent key tone of the genre, found on almost every single
page. As we have seen in chapter 4, Frank/Bernanke/Johnston create the figure of
an ‘economic naturalist’ in order to illustrate this rationale:
“Our ultimate goal is to produce economic naturalists people who see each human
action as the result of an implicit or explicit cost-benefit calculation. The economic
naturalist sees mundane details of ordinary existence in a new light and becomes
actively engaged in the attempt to understand them” (Frank/Bernanke/Johnston 2013,
viii).
The educational process is here accordingly to gouvernemental techniques
introduced by Foucault restated as a production process: a production process of
an economic subjectivity through its inner und free adoption by living individuals.
Students themselves become the primary actors of this production process. What
they learn to do as economic subjects is to calculate. In the most distinguished
situations of daily life, this subject continuously balances costs and benefits –
always searching for an individually optimal outcome of her decisions. Miller points
out, that the universality of this economic rationale does not only expand to
different life situations but also to different feelings and motivations bound to
individual decisions, hence, to the most interior and private parts of human
existence:
“Self-interest does not always mean increasing one's wealth measured in dollars and
cents. We assume that individuals seek many goals, not just increased wealth measured
in monetary terms. Thus, the self-interest part of our economic-person assumption
includes goals relating to prestige, friendship, love, power, helping others, creating
works of art, and many other matters” (Miller 2012, 6; see also Gwartney et al. 2006, 5).
In the given data sample, students of economic introductory courses receive a
constant flow of examples, end-of-chapter questions, quizzes and pictoral
information. Through these didactical features, students are appealed to conceive
their lives as an economic enterprise and their life experiences as governed by
economic laws: “Economics touches every aspect of our lives and the fundamental
18
concepts which are introduced can be applied across a whole range of life
experiences” (Mankiw/Taylor 2014, x; italics L.B.). Ranging from questions of love,
power to art, health and education, economics textbook knowledge allows for
definite and true decisions in daily life. To apply a calculating rationale in a whole
range of daily examples therefore becomes a decisive didactical feature of
standard economic education. In the end, the educational subject shall have
learned to lead and govern itself on the basis of given identity and action options. In
this sense, subjectivational processes and techniques may unleash a feeling of
powerfulness or even superiority.17
The paradox and clue of this economic subjectivation is the fact that the subject
being produced already exists. In the performative compliance with the identity
option offered, the subject realizes and incorporates a truth that before was not
tangible, an abstract and conceptual truth (chap. 3). In this sense, the
subjectivational process introduced by economics textbooks produces subjects
that had always existed before – but up to this point only as “real fictions”
(Bröckling 2016, 10 ff.). This strange feature of the process aligns with a typical
characteristic of neoliberal techniques of power:
“The programs of (self-) government are both descriptive and prescriptive: they always
presume a reality that they describe and problematize on the one hand, and in which
they intervene trying to change or transform it on the other hand”
(Bröckling/Krasmann/Lemke 2011, 11).
The frame „Become who you are!“ offers an identity option that reveals itself as
true in the very moment of compliance. Hence, it is a productive frame. In a similar
sense, Zuidhof speaks of standard economic education in sharp difference to
classical liberal education as “market constructivist” education (Zuidhof 2014, 176
f.). According to this last frame, economic education is not just meaningful because
one can learn who he is, but actually because one can become the one she ever
were. Although this ‘who’ as well as the production process of this ‘who’ is strongly
social and standardized in character, the subject nevertheless supposes to establish
a unique and distinguished identity. Therein lays the tragedy of a life in modern
(economic) subjectivity.
17 In the given sample there indeed exist several examples of a self-proclaimed ‘superiority of
economists’ (Fourcade/Ollion/Algan 2015). Although shortly covered in chapter 3, I did not
elaborate on this specific point.
19
6 Conclusion
Chapter 5 clearly showed that the frames reconstructed in the course of this article
do actually bare the possibility to tie them together by means of a synchronizing
“story line” (Keller 2005, n.p.). The arising bigger picture, the “arrangement of
interpretation” (Keller 2011a, 243; transl. L.B.) or “narrative structure” (Keller
2011b, 58) of the economics textbook discourse could start with the introduction
of a non-tangible space of economic laws governing individual and social action
(frame 1). Students then learn that these laws do not only reign outside, but also
within themselves (frame 3). The content of these laws and thereby of the students
themselves is a rational, optimizing pattern of behavior. Due to its acclaimed
ontological character, the realization of the pattern becomes imperative, leading to
homogenized behavior in the social arena of a competitive market (frames 2 & 3).
Regardless of the question whether this or other synthetized narrations promise to
be meaningful I here want to stress upon the fact that to the addressed audience
the discourse does not offer this possibility to reflect upon the possible meaning of
economic education. One of the key features of the frames reconstructed in
chapter 4 and 5 is the transfer of a specific content and quality of an identity option.
The process of this transfer and its possible reactions at least for the readers
remains widely implicit. Students are not being confronted with the fact that any
classificatory act is a “process of decision-making”, and hence, “every verbal
expression can be understood as an ‘act of power’ because it coins a specific reality,
a specific term, thereby excluding other possibilities” (Keller 2011a, 244; transl.
L.B.). At least the sample considered here does univocally not shed light on the fact
that students might decide freely to adopt certain frames and correlating identity
offerings or not. In the end, one (and only one) decision shall be made: to accept
and incorporate the ‘brutal truths of economics’. In this specific sense, the
subjectivational process described in chapter 5 and its specific form (chapter 3) and
content (chapter 4) of knowledge is pervasive in character. Recent textbook
studies conducted by Silja Graupe and Theresa Steffestun actually proof by means
of linguistic and metaphor analysis that introductory economics textbooks do
contain a considerable amount of techniques the cognitive sciences attest to have
a pervasive effect on the emotionality, subjectivity and value base of its readers
without them consciously noticing it (Graupe 2017; Graupe/Steffestun 2018).
Especially when taking into account the potential public reach of the economics
textbook discourse (see chapter 2), such findings raise serious concerns.
Furthermore one has to take note of the fact that the final frame in a strict sense
of the word actually cannot produce meaning – at least not for those being
exposed to it as readers. As we have seen in chapter 5 the ends of the educational
process within this frame do not remain with the educational subjects themselves,
but with the ones governing the process as such. The ends therefore lay outside the
educational process and students (as well as teachers) systematically do not take
part in the development and assessment of these ends. The ultimate end of
20
gouvernemental processes rather seems to exhaust itself in the expansion of its
reach and the maximization of its efficiency (Foucault 1991 [1978], 95). With the
ends lying outside the educational sphere and subjects, its success obviously cannot
be evaluated from the perspective of this sphere and subjects. It is certainly this
alienation of economic education from educational purposes that opens way for a
loss of meaning for students (and teachers). This is to say that the questions,
imaginations and expectations of economics students actually do not take part in
their study experience or only the one of a disturbing factor (Pühringer/Bäuerle
2018).
But certainly also the frames presented in chapters 3 and 4 appear at least
questionable with respect to a traditional understanding of education in the sense
of Bildung (Borsche 2015). Neither the reproduction of everlasting truths, nor a
profitable use of this knowledge aims at enabling students to develop a critical and
reflective attitude in scientific as well as daily matters. But certainly this ability is
urgently demanded in a time that constantly points to the dangers of all-too-
hardened truths about the world and one self. To name only one area, the research
of present economization processes clearly shows that the exclusive and
unquestioned application of standard economic thought, terms and advices bears
numerous examples of collective loss and failure.18
In the course of his latest works, Foucault himself points at a term of education
that might give guidance in the context of these developments. In its original
meaning of the word (lat.: educere) it means the overcoming of one self by the help
of others: to give a hand, to show someone out, to extricate (Foucault 2005, 134;
see Masschelein 1996, 2010 for its adoption). In this sense of the word, educational
processes potentially give time and space to uncover the dispositional heritage of
ones’ cultural context with the aim of reaching its borders to gain sight of a fresh,
yet always present world. In a heavily and increasingly economized world, economic
education could be at the centre of such a process.
In order to gain this presence of a concrete, speaking, acting and certainly suffering
world we always share as humans, present economics would have to revive an
educational and scientific tradition that centers the subject-matter and the
disciplines’ self-reflexive relationship to it (Salin 1920; Masschelein/Wimmer 1996.).
Educational programs should never foreclose the decision how to deal with the
subject-matter in question but rather help to adequately and responsibly deal with
it in scientific as well as ordinary ways. It is precisely the gap of control irritating
human capital theorists – a space of ultimate freedom – that actually constitutes
the attempt of education in the former sense. This is what Bildung originally meant
to establish and foster.
18 For empirical examples of economization processes in different social spheres see Klenk/Pavolini
(2015) (welfare state), Spring (2011) (education) and Akyel (2013) (funeral parlor).
21
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