ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the education department and gender and education as generic terms covering the whole case study period. In the structured interaction perspective, policy work is centred on the interplay between the projects of the different stakeholders, and the negotiation and institution building that goes on in an attempt to constitute widely acceptable outcomes. In the social construction perspective, the focus is on the knowledge that is seen as relevant, and the forms of measurement that are used, the discourses that are used, and the technologies of governing, which serve to focus and channel attention and commitment. While the policy-workers do, to some extent, talk about policy in terms of authorised choice, they tend to see it much more in terms of structured interaction, with policy as a site of contestation and policy work as a struggle to maintain a particular agenda in the face of opposition.
