Untangling the global-distant-local knot: the politics of national academic achievement testing in Japan

Abstract

This study examines one of the most notable manifestations of Japanese education's incorporation into the global education restructuring movement: the 2007 reintroduction of national academic achievement testing ('zenkoku gakuryoku gakushuu joukyou chousa'). In so doing, I aim to untangle the complex intermingling of national and global pressures as the new mode of test-based governance became embedded in the Japanese education policy context. The study situates the discussion of global policy convergence in a close analysis of the Japanese history of political struggles over national academic testing and the domestic power dynamics at the time of the policy implementation. Particular focus is placed on the role of the Ministry of Education and other key political figures that facilitated, blocked, and mediated the globally circulated governance model and thus struggled over the particular configuration of the national assessment. In conclusion, I locate the findings in the wider literature on the complex link between global policy convergence and national particularities in education policy studies, and in so doing tease out the insights for articulating the role of 'engaged' policy scholarship in the increasingly globalized politics of education reform.