Power, authority and expertise
Policy making about relationships and sex education in English primary schools
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 11487855 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Rachel Wilder (0000-0002-2225-6002, University of Bath, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2023 |
| Volume | 38 |
| Issue | 5 |
| Pages | 782-802 |
| Publication date | 2023-09-03 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Education Policy (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0268-0939 • E-ISSN: 1464-5106 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/02680939.2022.2028309 |
| OpenAlex | W4207003715 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 29 |
This paper analyses the experiences of English primary school leaders who perform critical roles in interpreting government policy and navigating the landscape to design relationship and sex education (RSE) for their pupils. It considers schools as sites of political contestation and educators as policy actors, the voices of whom are often absent in the literature about RSE. Drawing on Peter Morriss’ theory of power, the paper considers how primary school decision makers utilise their epistemic abilities to advance their policy preferences and how structures of authority and legitimacy energize and constrain them in their policy-making work. The findings suggest a paradox in power: while the national government has delegated decision-making about RSE to individual schools, it has simultaneously failed to uniformly equip schools to make appropriate policies about RSE and enabled parents to deny schools’ credibility and authority as leaders in RSE
Credibility · Government (linguistics · Legitimacy · Pedagogy · Political science · Politics · Power (physics · Public relations · Sociology · Work (physics · Children's Rights and Participation · Gender Politics and Representation · Gender Roles and Identity Studies · Law · Public Administration
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Sex and relationships education
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Policy actors
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1 |
| Citation span | 2024 - 2025 (2) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 2 |