Neoliberalism and Environmental Education: An Analysis of Australian Online Recruitment Advertisements

Abstract

This paper draws upon content and critical discourse analysis to probe the infiltration and material effects of neoliberalism in environmental education. Specifically, the analysis explores how neoliberal discourse in Australian online recruitment advertisements discursively constructs environmental education in terms of its nature, subject positions and social practices. The argument subscribes to the view that neoliberalism is not a monolithic project based on a unitary and coherent philosophy, but a complex, contradictory and often hybrid assemblage. Furthermore, the argument advances that empirical studies. such as the qualitative analysis of recruitment advertisements (re)presented here. contest the putative hegemony of neoliberalism by drawing the contextualised complexities and contradictions into relief and, thereby, open to critique and resistance.