Page 22 - Education in a Digital World

Developing a Global Perspective 9

justification for more specific actions. This reflects the Foucauldian notion of
discourse as the historical and cultural production of systems of knowledge and
beliefs which is shaped, and shapes, our behaviour (Foucault 1981). This perspective
highlights the role that ‘globalisation’ can play as an imaginary in contemporary
educational technology – i.e. as a vehicle for all sorts of ideological agendas. This
raises questions over the ways in which notions of ‘globalisation’ and ‘globalised’
aspects of society such as educational technology are described, how these descrip-
tions shape what we do and do not see in educational technologies and, then,
influence how these educational technologies are ultimately used and treated in
society. It is therefore important to ask what such ‘stories’ omit (and therefore imply
as insignificant) and question the assumptions presented to us as ‘fact’. Furthermore,
examination of globalisation as discourse can help reveal the structures of power and
real shaping concerns behind the ostensibly bland, corporate face of ‘globalised’
society. These are all key themes that we shall return to throughout the book.
That said, in order to understand the significance of globalisation as discourse,
it perhaps makes sense to first consider the tangible forms of globalisation as process –
i.e. in terms of apparently global products, policies and outcomes. Most definitions
of the processes of globalisation centre on matters of space, place and time, as well
as the movement of people, ideas and information within them. Perhaps the most-
straightforward description is offered by David Held and colleagues, who describe
globalisation as:

a process (or set of processes) which embodies a transformation in the spatial
organisation of social relations and transactions – assessed in terms of
their extensibility, intensity, velocity and impact-generating transcontinental
or interregional flows and networks of activity, interaction, and the exercise
of power.
(Held et al. 1999, p.16)

Central to this description is the movement of ‘flows’ of ideas, information,
practices, institutions, objects and people interacting with local populations and local
contexts. Allied to this notion of global flows, then, are the various terrains, routes
and conduits along which these movements take place (what Held refers to as
spatial organisations). Here then, the notion of ‘scapes’ can also be used to refer to
a wide array of means of transportation of people, objects, and information. As
Held’s description also implies, it is important to consider how these various ‘scapes’
are organised through networks – both within and across different societies
(see Urry 2002).
The highly networked nature of these processes is evident in Arjun Appadurai’s
(1990) description of different global flows and scapes that underpin contemporary
society. These include flows of people (what Appadurai refers to as ‘ethnoscapes’)
such as global workers, business travellers, students, tourists and migrants relocating
to other nations. Appadurai also points towards flows of ideas and practices