notes that it is first and foremost a culture of performativity that is derived from the application of neoliberal principals, producing a discourse around three key features: an audit mentality that advocates performance driven mechanisms; interventionalist regulation, achieved in education through the inspection of schools by Ofsted; and a market environment in which parents become consumers. It is useful to synthesise these features with the thoughts of Ball (2008), that such discourse has re-professionalised individuals, forcing the creation of school managers or what Foucault (1977, p.294) would consider ‘technicians of behaviour’. Therefore, whilst a drive towards greater efficiency may offer clear advantages, the collateral effects of this drive creates significant discussion regarding its suitability for education.

Whilst neoliberal thinking posits all attention to be dedicated to the consumer (Ball, 1998), the field of education is ultimately dependent on the teachers and school leaders that allow consumers to engage with the product (Hirsch, 2002). By diverting attention to these producers, rather than consumers, the application of neoliberal principals and a culture of performativity becomes increasingly undesirable, as practitioners are concerned firstly with being seen to be effective, and secondly with actually being effective (Ball, 2003; Maddock, Drummond, Koralek and Nathan, 2007). This is directly reflective of the panoptic surveillance theory discussed by Foucault (1977), as teachers ultimately begin to observe themselves as a result of the ‘terrors of performativity’ stated by Ball (2003, p.216), leading to the workload of a teacher becoming unspecified and often unknown. Personal experience in the primary phase translates this culture into a redefining of what is considered an ‘effective’ teacher, as the delivery of a content is now overshadowed by a need to consistently prioritise. Whilst on an initial basis this relates to prioritising daily responsibilities, a more damaging analysis is derived from the prioritising of children, ordered by those that are likely to produce the greatest output with the least investment (Ball, 2017; Gray et al., 1999; Shore and Wright, 1999). Whilst advocates of neoliberalism may contest that such practice is not encouraged, it remains difficult to judge this as anything other than a product of a performative and output driven culture.