ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the question of what the consequences are of the influx of new ideas and governance and education practices for Danish teachers’ ethics and quality of work. Over the past three to four decades, national governments have met a growing wealth of ideas and inspiration for education and governance reforms from transnational agencies like the OECD or the European Commission.
Two discourses form the focus of the discussion: the outcomes-based discourse with transnational and national governance and policy roots and history, and the democratic Bildung discourse that builds on a selection of educational concepts and theories. Governing schools and teachers’ working conditions and aims have changed fundamentally over the past four to six decades partly due to the intake of new international forms of power and influence, as clearly illustrated in the Danish School Act of 2013 and, more generally, in the use of new forms of public sector governance and relations in contracts.
