The article focuses on the changes in the field of higher education which have occurred during the period of systemic transformation in Poland; particularly on the influence of the regulations introduced in 2011. Following Cris Shore and Susan Wright the author argues that reforms are not only routine, bureaucratic practices but they have a profound impact on social life. In the light of this claim she suggests that the new law not only enforced structural adjustments in the academia but also triggered the process of reshaping the idea of university itself. This shift can be explained in terms of neoliberalisation (in the Foucauldian sense), as the process of transforming academia into the institution driven and dominated by the discourses of efficiency. In order to achieve that goal various tools developed for measuring academic and teaching performance, assessing research quality and institutional effectiveness were introduced. The author pays particular attention to practices of auditing, also defined as ‘rituals of verification’, which play a significant role in the process of producing accountable, selfdisciplined and calculative neoliberal subjects.

In the text, we first recall the historical contexts of changes in public education, by recalling them to shape the distance necessary to reflect on the current solstices and transformations taking place in this area. One of the main tasks of a universal and uniform school in a modernizing Europe was to ensure equal educational start for all children. In neoliberal reality, this task ceased to be obvious, and with the significant participation of parents, the foundations of the school’s public character were undermined. Parents from a politically and economically dominant middle class, seeking to gain an advantage over their children, simply do not want public school. The public school defense is therefore easily marginalized. Using the example of recent reforms (e.g. American), we show how schools are no longer places where people belonging to different layers or social classes can create a common world. From this perspective, we analyze issues arising from the questioning of neoliberal social policy that has taken place in recent years. In Poland, it finds expression in, among others in the electoral victory of the grouping (Law and Justice – PiS), aiming to restore the previously overlooked social groups to their rightful place in public space. One could expect that the style of the previous educational policy will therefore be replaced by a more egalitarian, equality policy, preventing unjustifiable selections limiting the life chances of ‘lessborn’ children. However, PiS education policy goes in the opposite direction and expands the system’s selection strategies (elite high schools, no more “mass” access to schools, etc.). Trying to find out the reasons for this contradiction, we focus our attention on the profits that in public discourse brings – as practiced today – the replacement of society by the nation.

This article presents Finnish educational changes in the context of The Nordic Model of Social Democracy improved since 1963 versus English model of Neoliberal Democracy based on conservatism since 1979 with its roots in the late eighteenth century in Europe. The reform of education in Finland was supported by a new curriculum and different methods of teaching. In 1963 students started to have an access to the highest-quality education and it was not related to students’ place of living, richness or annual income. On the other side in England, privatization and centralization were the main pillars of the reform with neoliberalism, neoconservatism and its market competition in education. The central government was responsible for the provision of educational services, educational policy, and planning the direction of the educational system. Teachers faced an ultimatum: “either submit to re-education or lose your job” (Jones, p. 43). The 1988 reform strengthened the ideological control of education and accelerated differentiation between schools.

Artykuł opisuje dwa przypadki rozwoju państwa opiekuńczego (welfare state): polski i izraelski. W obu przykładach mieliśmy do czynienia z przejściem z etatystycznego państwa opiekuńczego do modelu neoliberalnego charakterystycznego dla państw anglosaskich. W przypadku Polski dokonało się to częściowo, w przypadku Izraela w stopniu znacznie większym. Analizując rozwój welfare state na wskazanych przykładach, spróbowano także odpowiedzieć na pytanie o przyczynę kierunku tych przemian.

Tezą artykułu jest twierdzenie, iż obecna sytuacja kryzysowa w obszarze zdrowia publicznego nie musi oznaczać analogicznego kryzysu w sferze gospodarczej, czyli kapitalizmu neoliberalnego. Zakładamy, że obecna sytuacja, jaką stanowią warunki pandemiczne, współgra z gospodarką kapitalistyczną, wskutek czego system ten jawi się jako stabilny i efektywny jednocześnie. W naszym artykule prezentujemy dialektyczny ogląd ideologicznych aspektów pandemicznej rzeczywistości, który koreluje z twierdzeniem o uspołecznieniu kosztów i prywatyzacji zysków procesów ekonomiczno-politycznych.

World Social Forum as a subject of cosmopolitan politics

The World Social Forum emerged at the beginning of the 21st century as the leading subject of the alterglobalist movement. It brings together movements that oppose neo-liberal globalization and fight against the ever-weaker control of citizens over the actions of powerful national and supranational entities. As an institution uniting diverse groups excluded from all over the world, it aims to create a platform of global resistance. The innovative dimension of the Forum is to challenge the narrow understanding of alternatives to the current economic and political order and to create conditions for a cosmopolitan policy aimed at grassroots, decentralized and democratic global governance. The aim of the article is to present the characteristics of the World Social Forum as a subject of cosmopolitan politics, to show the challenges ahead and to reveal its political potential.

David Harvey’s theory of accumulation by dispossession: new research perspectives – the case of Jason W. Moore

This article reconstructs David Harvey’s accumulation by dispossession (ABD) theory aimed at explaining the specifics of capital accumulation under neoliberal capitalism. Reaching back to the thought of Marx and Rosa Luxemburg, Harvey proposed an impressive theory of qualitative change within the capitalist mode of production. However, as his critics have convincingly presented, Harvey’s concept struggles with the problems presented in the text. The solution to these problems appears to be the school of “world-ecology”, analyzed here on the example of one of its representatives, Jason W. Moore. By solving the problems that Bin and Ras wrote about, it creates the possibility for APW to become a theory that shows a certain continuum of quantitative change within capitalism. In other words, Moore’s research perspective creates new perspectives for the application of APW.

New Zealand: idea of nation

New Zealand has been a nation of firsts and innovators of many occasions. Moreover, it has also been a leading nation for civil and humanitarian issues. Peter Fraser was eager to invite over seven hundred Polish children to the country during World War II to keep them safe from the threat. Modern world has been shaped by past experience, where apart from cultural heritage and people’s backgrounds or origins neoliberalism created new conditions in which people around the world struggle to live. Neo liberalism along with capitalism unifying our world have influenced the notion of common values for different people. Nation is one of such values. We are now in the 21st century and it seems that New Zealand is at the forefront of progress on global scale in terms of understanding the concept of nation in global conditions. It is common knowledge that New Zealand depends mostly on exports, does it mean that New Zealand must compete by nation–branding with others on the global market?