ABSTRACT
Literacy education is indeed at a historical crossroads. If we are to take educational policymakers, politicians and the media at their word, it is the same old great debate replayed over and over again: declining standards, loss of the literary canon, troubled and unruly students, irresponsible parents and overly permissive teachers. These, we are told yet again, can be fixed by marketization of schools, increased testing, a return to the basics of reading and writing, better teachers, and a more disciplined approach to child-rearing, education and schooling. In this way, a neoliberal focus on tightened accountabilities and steering mechanisms blends seamlessly with a neoconservative educational fundamentalism: economic and bureaucratic rationalism in the delivery of the basics. This is the public policy doxa of literacy education.
