Governmentality and Psychological Strain in a Participatory Educational Paradigm: Conceptualising School Policy Discourse on Pupil Participation in the Swedish Upper Secondary School

Abstract: The aim of this thesis is to gain a deeper understanding of pupil participation from the perspective of psychological wellbeing through analysing school policy discourse related to the reformation of the Swedish upper secondary school in 2011 (Gy11) and interviews with Swedish upper secondary school counsellors. Participatory learning is part of a new educational paradigm and coincides with Article 12 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the child’s right to be heard. The welfare and rights of children are profound parts of the Swedish educational agenda but recent developments indicate a deterioration in the psychological wellbeing amongst Swedish adolescents. By conducting a Foucauldian discourse analysis and qualitative interviews with school counsellors in the Swedish upper secondary school and extending the Job-Demand-Control model by Karasek and Theorell with the Foucauldian concept of disciplinary power, the author suggests that active participatory learning approaches and the language they entail may be productive in terms of constructing responsible and active citizens. Pupil participation does, however, also involve aspects of demoralisation and strain through self-regulating technologies and governmentality, which may cause a deterioration in perceived psychological wellbeing.