Le Conseil national des programmes (1985-1994): l'institutionnalisation chaotique d'une entreprise reformatrice
In: Politix: revue des sciences sociales du politique, Heft 2, S. 85-107
ISSN: 0295-2319
In the late 1980s, at a time when secularism is becoming a less and less mobilizing concept and "democratization" seems to have reached a deadlock, the minister of Education, Lionel Jospin, launches the renewal of the curriculum. The National Council for Curriculum which was created in 1990 is intended to be the kingpin of this reforming undertaking. By means of interviews and by using the results of a survey into records, the present article analyzes the territory struggles in the bureaucratic field between the National Council for Curriculum, the General Inspectorate of the Ministry of Education, the Directorate for Secondary Education; that is to say the three institutions which were in conflict at that time to take absolute power in the field of pedagogy. It shows how the progressive codification of an institutional modus vivendi makes it possible for a thorough reform of the secondary school curriculum to be initiated, the ending of which is the establishment of a the "common base of knowledge and skills". Adapted from the source document.