This article unpacks how neoliberal discourse functions as a dominant but problematic system of reasoning that changes and shifts the ways in which we come to think about early childhood education and care. A post-structuralist lens is deployed to understand the production of fears and hopes under the looming shadows of contemporary education reforms and social policies. Highlighting Taiwan, Hong Kong and Korea as three cases from East Asian cultures, this article seeks to elucidate how a similar neoliberal economic and political imaginary is at work to (re)construct East Asian children as human capital for the alchemy of productive citizens in the 21st century.
[Copyright of Policy Futures in Education is the property of Symposium Journals.]

In this article the author discusses some of the approaches that she takes in challenging student teachers to understand education in global context, rather than in a decontextualised or instrumental way. These approaches draw on the author's experience of being an educator from the 'global South' (the Caribbean) now working in the 'global North' (Australia). As the first black teacher that most Australian student teachers have encountered in their entire education, the author finds that she can offer them provocative educational narratives and questions stemming from a lifetime career in education, studying and working in various roles in schools, colleges, universities and ministries of education in Jamaica, Grenada, Hong Kong, the UK, the USA and Australia. The author sets out to disrupt the preconceptions of her students as a starting point in a collective journey of thinking differently about education.
[Copyright of Compare: A Journal of Comparative Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher’s website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03057925.2011.581513]

The process of reforming Hong Kong's higher education sector commenced in 2001, and the system moved into the post-massification era. Within five years, the post-secondary participation rate for the 17-20 age cohort had increased to 66 per cent. This target was achieved much earlier than the Government had planned. More educational opportunities have been made available in order to help society cope with the challenges of the knowledge-based economy. This policy has drawn repeated criticism from the media, students, and pressure groups concerned about the quality of the self-financed sub-degree programmes. Drawing upon the literature and published data, this paper examines the development of the higher education sector in the past decade. The key motives for the Government to expand the mass higher education sector include a globalised economy, unemployment, ideological changes in political leadership, and weaknesses inherent in the elitist approach. Self-financed programmes are offered in the sectors where the Government has not faced problems of financial stringency. However, articulation opportunities, quality of education and educated unemployment are the key challenges ahead.
[Copyright of Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1360080X.2011.550034]

This article examines how interest groups in Hong Kong have politicised national history, an unpopular school subject, for their own political ends and allied themselves with the PRC against the SAR government and its policy of not making it a single, independent, compulsory core subject in the school curriculum. The article argues that this has been made possible by the 'One country, two systems' administrative structure.
[Copyright of Curriculum Journal is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09585176.2011.550764]

德育及公民教育是2001年香港課程改革中四個關鍵項目之一，學校推行德育及公民教育是否成功，對學生的身心發展，以至社會的整體安定繁榮也有著密不可分的關係。政府於2001年就四個學習階段訂下德育及公民教育的課程框架，並在2008年作出修訂。本文以課程決定為討論的切人點，嘗試從內在及外在情景的視角，引用不同學者提出的相關理論作初步探討，並提出對香港德育及公民教育發展的個人觀點。
The Moral and Civic Education is one of four key tasks in the Hong Kong curriculum reform 2001. Whether the implementation of school moral and civic education is successful or not, it will impact the development of the student's body and mind, and even the stability and prosperity of the society as a whole. The government subscribed the moral and civic education curriculum framework in 2001 on four learning phases, and made the revision in 2008. This article attempts to explore the issue in view of curriculum decision making and from internal and external context perspectives together with related theories. Author’s point of view on the future development of Hong Kong moral and civic education will also be made.
[Copyright of Hong Kong Teachers' Centre Journal is the property of Hong Kong Teachers' Centre at http://www.edb.org.hk/hktc]

The ascendance to popularity of the liberal ideologies and the concepts of political economy of education will be put forward as the root cause for an increasing subordination of education objectives to national economic goals. Through a case study of the educational development of Hong Kong, this paper will evaluate the extent to which educational planning and policy decision should be guided by economic considerations. Although the rapid economic growth of Hong Kong and the rapid expansion of its education system in the past decades took place in parallel, there is no evidence that Hong Kong's economic success is directly brought about by its education. It will be concluded that apart from economic contributions, education has its own intrinsic values. While economic considerations are useful for planning and policymaking at a macro level, it may not be appropriate to indiscriminately apply economic principles in an intrusive way to direct the priorities of institution management and classroom teaching.
[Copyright of International Education Studies is the property of Canadian Center of Science and Education.
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