Is economics sufficient for the government of education?

Abstract

To the neo-classical economist, economics is a universal discipline, applicable to any and every social phenomenon. That which is not recognised in economics is discarded. When joined to power, for example in the management of educational institutions and systems, eonomics is characteristically normative: by imposing its own abstractions on an already-existing reality it begins to re-make that reality in its own image. Some implications for education and for the critique of the economics of education are discussed, with particular reference to human capital theory and input-output modelling in education.