The ‘OECD machine’ – Using a negative universality gaze to examine the OECD and its positive universal engineering fantasy

Deborah Heck; Dion Rüsselbæk Hansen; Elaine Sharpling; Paul McFlynn

doi:10.1177/00345237251361257

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The ‘OECD machine’ – Using a negative universality gaze to examine the OECD and its positive universal engineering fantasy

Journal article

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The ‘OECD machine’ – Using a negative universality gaze to examine the OECD and its positive universal engineering fantasy

Deborah Heck, Dion Rüsselbæk Hansen, Elaine Sharpling and Paul McFlynn

Research in Education , Vol.Advanced access

2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/00345237251361257

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Abstract

education policy

educators

lacks

desire

sublime objects

cultural criticism

Recently, there has been a greater emphasis, especially inspired by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), on the creation of educational policy that appears to want to control the future. This is evidenced by promoting an engineering fantasy in/for education that embodies positive universalism. We critically examine such positive universalism by drawing on the notion of negative universality (Kapoor & Zalloua, 2022ab) along with concepts of fantasy, desire and sublime objects (Žižek, 1989), and Rosa (2020) cultural criticism. We illustrate our concepts through the story of a skiing holiday where the fantasy of the perfect snowscape always fails to deliver what it promises. Here, travellers who desire the experience of skiing on ‘perfect snow’ are seduced by powerful advertising campaigns. Due to the unpredictability of nature, travellers are often faced with intrusive snow machines that noisily – and in a ‘vulgar’ way – engineer and manufacture the snowscape which spoils and punctures the fantasy of the perfect skiing conditions. Our paper critically examines the OECD’s (2019b) Learning Compass 2030 document, discussing the universal engineering fantasy that promises to produce certainty, moral improvement and control in/with education. We also analyse the accompanying OECD’s attitudes and values document (OECD, 2019a) that identifies a list of sublime objects such as respect, justice and Bildung to which all countries must aspire if they wish to succeed. We conclude that the policy documents of the OECD present a positive universal engineering fantasy that promises a non-antagonistic and harmonious future. However, such a future will be impossible to achieve. Hence, we call for educators to critically engage with negative universality to expose the lacks and contradictions always inherent in global policies. This would provide educators with an opportunity to reflect on and critically confront seductive policy and its engineering fantasy that captures their desires.

Details

Title: The ‘OECD machine’ – Using a negative universality gaze to examine the OECD and its positive universal engineering fantasy
Authors: Deborah Heck (Corresponding Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Education and Tertiary Access
Dion Rüsselbæk Hansen - University of Southern Denmark
Elaine Sharpling - University of Wales Trinity Saint David
Paul McFlynn - University of Ulster
Publication details: Research in Education , Vol.Advanced access
Publisher: Sage Publications Ltd.
DOI: 10.1177/00345237251361257
ISSN: 2050-4608; 0034-5237
Copyright note: © The Author(s) 2025. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
Data Availability: The data used in the project is referenced in the paper and publicly available via the OECD website.
Organisation Unit: School of Education and Tertiary Access
Language: English
Record Identifier: 991148433902621
Output Type: Journal article

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