Beniamin Knutsson

The point of departure of this article is an apparent antinomy. On the one hand, there is the powerful argument in political theory on the emergence and consolidation of a post-political condition. On the other hand, research in international and comparative education demonstrates how conflicts and power asymmetries continue to characterize education aid. Attempting to move beyond this antinomy we engage in a methodological discussion on how to study “the political” in education aid landscapes with strong post-political features. By reviewing the two sets of literature, and bringing them into conversation, we extract five methodological tenets: (i) taking “the political” seriously, (ii) looking beyond face value when scrutinizing policy arrangements, (iii) exploring everyday wars of position, (iv) focusing on subjects and situated practices, and (v) moving beyond scales by analyzing connections across territorial entities. The article primarily makes a methodological contribution but ultimately the findings can also be relevant to the world of policy making.

While access to antiretroviral therapy has improved worldwide, many people living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) still suffer from economic hardship. Socio-economic impact mitigation is therefore becoming an increasingly important component of the global HIV/AIDS response. The content of such strategies, however, is dependent on the political rationalities underpinning them. Drawing on fieldwork in Rwanda, this article explores programmatic efforts by the Rwandan government and its international partners to govern the economic life of PLHIV. These interventions are conceptualized as a form of biopolitics and the article analyses the neoliberal modalities of government through which it operates. At the centre of the strategy is a pretension to transform PLHIV from economically unproductive life, sustained by medical means, into a resilient and enterprising population willing to accept responsibility for their own livelihoods. However, according to the strategy, the only way for PLHIV to lead responsible economic lives is by daring to become entrepreneurial and enrolling in microcredit schemes. Thus the dubious message conveyed is that responsible conduct is tantamount to exposing oneself to risk. The article also discusses the complex coexistence of this neoliberal biopolitics and the Rwandan government's known efforts to exercise sovereign control.

In recent years there has been a massive influx of aid to civil society HIV/AIDS work in Africa. Drawing on fieldwork in Rwanda, this article explores, through a governmentality perspective, the rationalities and technologies of government that accompany the new funding schemes. The paper feeds into contemporary debates on the relevance of governmentality studies in Africa and on the complicated relationship between state, civil society, and international donors in the particular context of Rwanda. Despite the country's known record of authoritarian politics, the paper argues that Rwandan civil society organizations are in fact largely subject to advanced liberal rule, rendering them responsible and active in their own government. This global governmentality, in turn, unfolds through a post-political machinery that effectively blurs boundaries between international donor, state, and civil society institutions. Ultimately, this means that researchers interested in resistance must be prepared to extend their visual field considerably.

The special issue New Swedish environmental and sustainability education
research, published in Education & Democracy 20(1), introduced
a novel generation of Swedish ESD research. With the intention to spur
academic debate this rejoinder offers alternative interpretations of some
of the findings in the special issue. The article contests the special issue’s
proclaimed distinction between empirical studies and ideological debate
in the field of ESD research, and points to the contradiction between
the special issue’s promotion of ‘pluralism’ and the absence of critical
interrogations of sustainable development. Theoretically informed by
post-Marxist thought the concept post-politics is employed to shed new
light on sustainable development and its companion ESD. It is argued
that the contributions in the special issue are partly embedded in a post-political logic and that several findings are open for far more radical interpretations. This suggests, ultimately, that there is a need for alternative
pathways that can challenge and complement mainstream ESD research.

In the year 2000, Rwanda launched an ambitious long-term development strategy intended to render a fundamental transformation from an agrarian to a knowledge society by 2020. Knowledge society, however, could be viewed as a ‘floating signifier’ open for a wide range of interpretations. Guided by a policy translation perspective the aim of this article is to examine the ‘making’ of knowledge society in Rwanda. The article analyses how the government's notion of a projected knowledge society and attempts to manage globalisation to the benefit of Rwanda have translated into a set of educational policy priorities. This article further exposes various tensions that emerge in these translation processes, intimately linked to the country's deep poverty, complex political situation and high-flying ambitions.

In the context of knowledge-intensive globalisation and severe poverty, policy makers in the South face various educational planning dilemmas. These are ultimately political, implying that there are no ways of avoiding tensions and trade-offs when attempting to handle them. Such dilemmas have been subject to debate in the research community and have been framed differently in different historical contexts. The contemporary development policy discourse, however, largely conceals the existence of dilemmas by suggesting that we have reached a global consensus regarding the role of education in development. This article illustrates that this consensus is imaginary and consequently aims to reframe educational planning dilemmas in the contemporary policy context. It is shown that the dilemmas have changed character and now largely revolve around how to navigate and negotiate in highly complex political landscapes. Future research should focus on such ongoing wars of position and expose the many tensions concealed by the hegemonic policy discourse.