ABSTRACT
The pupil voice movement of the 1990s saw a way of countering the demoralization of a centrally imposed curriculum, which caused a distrustful culture of accountability and uninspired children. The pupil voice movement again raised questions concerning the ways in which children and childhood were thought about, and within the sociology of childhood in the 1990s efforts were made to convince policy makers to take childhood seriously. Her childhood was viewed not as a biological reality but as a social construct. While schools were slow to change, children were not. Children need not be thought of as having inferior status to adults, as being restricted to subordinate and restricted roles, dependent or as a minority group. However, the neo-liberal superstructure demanded much more than this as school improvement and individual attainment of higher standards ruled the rhetoric and practice of public policy.
