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Teacher professionalidentity: competingdiscourses, competingoutcomesJudyth SachsVersion of record first published: 10 Nov 2010.

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DOCUMENTS AND DEBATES

Teacher professional identity: competingdiscourses, competing outcomes

Judyth Sachs

This paper focuses on issues of the professional identity of teachers in Australia under conditions of significantchange in government policy and educational restructuring. Two discourses, democratic and managerial profes-sionalism are identified which are shaping the professional identity of teachers. Democratic professionalism isemerging from the profession itself while managerialist professionalism is being reinforced by employing authori-ties through their policies on teacher professional development with their emphasis on accountability and effective-ness. The second part of the paper examines the types of professional identity emerging from these discourses. Thetwo identities identified are the entrepreneurial and the activist identity. While these identities are not fixed, never-theless at various times and in various contexts teachers may move between these two professional identities.

Issues of teacher professionalism and teacher professional identity are now evident inmuch research literature emerging from the USA, UK and Australia. Recent educa-tion reforms and the associated changes in working conditions and professional expec-tations have meant that issues of teacher professionalism and professional identity arebeing contested at both the level of policy and of practice. Indeed, current debates inthe public and scholarly arena indicate that there are competing views about the nat-ure of teacher professionalism. Furthermore, in some instances debates still circulateabout whether or not teaching is a profession. What counts as teacher professionalismhas come to be a site of struggle between various interest groups concerned with thebroader enterprise of education. Some would say that it is in the best interests of gov-ernment for teaching not to be seen as a profession as it gives greater opportunity forregulative control of the profession. Others would suggest that given the specializedknowledge base of teachers, the increased demand for professional standards and thegreat demands for teachers to see themselves as knowledge workers, then they haveearned the status of being a profession in a more orthodox sense.

In this paper the focus is on issues of professional identity of teachers in Australiaunder conditions of significant change in government policy and educational restruc-turing. The argument is in two parts. First, is that two competing discourses are shap-ing the professional identity of teachers. These discourses are democratic andmanagerial professionalism. I suggest that democratic professionalism is emergingfrom the profession itself while managerialist professionalism is being reinforced byemploying authorities through their policies on teacher professional development

Judyth Sachs is Professor of Education in the Faculty of Education, University of Sydney. She is Pro-

Dean (International and External Relations) in the Faculty of Education.

Journal of Educational Pol icy ISSN 0268± 0939 print/ISSN 1464± 5106 online # 2001 Taylor & Francis Ltd

http://www.tandf.co.uk/journal s

DOI: 10.1080/0268093001002534 7

J. EDUCATION POLICY, 2001, VOL. 16, NO. 2, 149 ± 161

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with their emphasis on accountability and effectiveness. The second part of the paperexamines the types of professional identity emerging from these discourses and theinfluence that these have on the teaching profession itself in terms of its ability to pro-vide moral and intellectual leadership for the profession of teaching. Dependingupon the contexts in which teachers are working and how they negotiate and makemeaning of these, discourses will construct particular identities for teachers in theirprofessional lives. These are not fixed for at times these may move between entrepre-neurial and activist identities.1

Recent reforms particularly concerning devolution and marketization havegiven rise to a set of paradoxes about the nature of teaching as a profession and aboutthe professional identity and professional development of teachers. First, is that thecall for teacher professionalism related to a revisioning of occupational identity, isoccurring at a time when there is evidence that teachers are being deskilled and theirwork is intensified. Second, is that while it is acknowledged that rethinking classroompractice is exceptionally demanding, fewer resources are being allocated to teacherlearning. Third, the teaching profession is being exhorted to be autonomous whileat the same time it is under increasing pressure from politicians and the communityto be more accountable and to maintain standards. As a consequence of the paradoxesunderpinning the changes in education policy and practice the very idea of teacherprofessionalism and professional identity needs to be debated and resolved.

Dom inant discourses of teacher professionalism

Clarke and Newman (1997: 7) suggest that Professionalism operates as an occupa-tional strategy, defining entry and negotiating the power and rewards due to exper-tise, and as an organizational strategy, shaping the patterns of power, place andrelationships around which organizations are coordinated’. This observation welldescribes the development of ideologies and policies of teacher professionalism inAustralia. Recent political and associated policy changes in Australia have seen issuesof teacher professionalism circulate in public and policy debate. Dominant discoursesin teacher professionalism assert particular realities and priorities. Sinclair (1996: 232)suggests that

How people locate themselves in relation to certain discourses reflects the socially sanctioned dominance ofcertain ideologies and subjugation of others. Because discourses vary in their authority (Gavey 1989: 464)at one particular time one discourse, such as managerialism or market approach, seems natural’ whileanother . . . struggles to find expression in the way experience is described.

Indeed definitions of professionalism’, what constitutes a profession and so on havebeen sites of academic and ideological struggle between union leaders, bureaucratsand academics that are currently being played out in a variety of settings. There is nosingular version of what constitutes professionalism or teaching as a profession that isshared by these diverse groups. This is despite the fact that each of these groups claimsto be acting in the best interests of teachers individually and collectively. FollowingFurlong et al. (2000: 5)

The three concepts of knowledge, autonomy and responsibility central to a traditional notion of profession-alism, are often seen as interrelated. It is because professionals face complex and unpredictable situationsthat they need a specialized body of knowledge; if they are to apply that knowledge, it is argued that theyneed the autonomy to make their own judgements. Given that they have autonomy, it is essential thatthey act with responsibility ± collectively they need to develop appropriate professional values.

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Discourses offer particular kinds of subject position and identity through whichpeople come to view their relationships with different loci of power (Clarke andNewman 1997: 92). This is an important point for this paper given the emergence oftwo distinct but not entirely oppositional discourses that are circulating aroundteacher professionalism. An examination of policy documents at the federal and statelevels and public debates in the media reveals that two versions of teacher profession-alism are evident; democratic professionalism and managerial professionalism(Preston 1996). These discourses set the limits of what can be said, thought and donewith respect to debates and initiatives designed to enhance the political project ofteacher professionalism.

Recent reform agendas in Australia, the UK and elsewhere have served to chal-lenge traditional conceptions of teacher professionalism, in particular issues of teacherautonomy. However, Furlong et al. (2000) in referring to the UK argue that theaspiration to change teacher professionalism by influencing the nature of the knowl-edge, skills and values to which new teachers are exposed is also significant. They goon to argue that `The assumption behind policy within this area has been that changesin the form and content of initial teacher education will, in the long run, serve to con-struct a new generation of teachers with different forms of knowledge, different skillsand different professional values’ (p. 6). Recent policies have given rise to a new pro-fessionalism among teachers. Sadly, as Furlong et al. (2000) claim, the time has nowlong gone when isolated unaccountable professionals made curriculum and pedagogi-cal decisions alone without reference to the outside world. The new professionalismnow developing and mandated by the state is what I describe as managerial profes-sionalism.

Managerial professionalism

In some respects the discourse of managerial professionalism has been the more domi-nant of the two discourses given its impact on the work of teachers through factorssuch as organizational change, imperatives for teachers in schools to be more account-able and for systems to be more efficient and economic in their activities. Clarke(1995) suggests that two themes underpin the new managerialism: `universalism’and isomorphism’. Universalism holds that all organizations are basically the sameand irrespective of their specific functions, need to pursue efficiency. Isomorphism isthe assumption that commercial organizations are the most naturally occurring formof coordination, compared with which public sector organizations are deviant(quoted in Whitty et al. 1998: 52).

Managerial discourses make two distinct claims: that efficient management cansolve any problem; and that practices which are appropriate for the conduct of privatesector enterprises can also be applied to the public sector (Rees 1995). Furthermore,as Pollitt (1990) notes, the values of managerialism have been promoted as being uni-versal: management is inherently good, managers are the heroes, managers shouldbe given the room and autonomy to manage and other groups should accept theirauthority. These ideologies have found themselves to be prevalent in educationbureaucracies as well as in schools themselves, especially in the management practicesfound in schools.

Within the education sector, recent policies promoting devolution and decentral-ization have provided the conditions for an alternative form of teacher professional-

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ism to emerge, one that gains its legitimacy though the promulgation of policies andthe allocation of funds associated with those policies, namely managerial professional-ism. This discourse attempts to redefine what is meant by teacher professionalismand how teachers practice it individually and collectively. Whitty et al. (1998) describethe current situation well in the UK and elsewhere when they claim that

Whether or not what we are witnessing here is a struggle between a professionalizing project or a deprofes-sionalizing one, it is certainly a struggle among different stakeholders over the definition of teacher profes-sionalism and professionality for the twenty-first century (p. 65)

Where devolution and decentralization have been at the core of reform agendas,teachers are placed in a long line of authority in terms of their accountability for reach-ing measurable outcomes that stretches through the principal, to the district/regionaloffice, to the central office. Brennan (1996: 22) describes this corporate managementmodel as emphasizing:

a professional who clearly meets corporate goals, set elsewhere, manages a range of students well and docu-ments their achievements and problems for public accountability purposes. The criteria of the successful pro-fessional in this corporate model is of one who works efficiently and effectively in meeting thestandardised criteria set for the accomplishment of both students and teachers, as well as contributing to theschool’ s formal accountability processes.

Managerialism has also had a significant impact on the work of school principals, aswell as teachers. Recent restructuring has meant that the principal has moved fromthe role of senior colleague to oneof institutional manager. Fergusson (1994) describesthe impact of these reforms on the teaching profession

the reform movement and the drive towards managerialism prudently took the initial professional forma-tion of teachers within its ambit. Together they have led to a careful scrutiny of the sources of notions of pro-fessionalism and collective self-concept, and the values, assumptions and expectations that are associatedwith them: the entire gamut of the processes of group socialization, combined with the development of pro-fessional identity and allegiance to academic community’ . . . (p. 106).

According to Clarke and Newman (1997: 92± 93) the new discourses of managerial-ism offer new subject positions and patterns of identification ± those of managementas opposed to professionalism. They go on to add that `managerial discourses createthe possibilities within which individuals construct new roles and identities and fromwhich they derive ideas about the logic of institutional change’ (p. 93). In terms ofteachers’ professional development and the profession’s moves to establish new andmore active notions of teacher professionalism, the managerialist approach directlycontrasts with democratic professionalism. Furthermore, advocates of each of thesekinds of professionalism are often at loggerheads with each other because unions andother professional bodies adopt democratic professionalism while systems andemployers advocate managerial professionalism.

Democratic professionalism

The second of the discourses circulating about teacher professionalism is that of demo-cratic professionalism. Apple (1996) suggests that an alternative to state control isnot traditional professionalism, but a democratic professionalism which seeks todemystify professional work and build alliances between teachers and excluded con-stituencies of students, parts and members of the community on whose behalfdecisions have traditionally been made either by professions or by the state.

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Preston (1996: 192) argues that democratic professionalism was a concept used bythe then Australian Teachers Union (ATU).

. . . democratic professionalism does not seek to mystify professional work, nor to unreasonably restrictaccess to that work; it facilitates the participation in decision making by students, parents and others andseeks to develop a broader understanding in the community of education and how it operates. As profes-sionals, teachers must be responsible and accountable for that which is under their control, both individuallyand collectively through their unions (Australian Teachers Union, 1991: 1± 2, quoted in Preston 1996: 192)

The core of democratic professionalism is an emphasis on collaborative, cooperativeaction between teachers and other educational stakeholders. Preston (1996) maintainsthat this approach is a strategy for industry development, skill development andwork organization. According to Brennan (1996) it suggests that the teacher has awider responsibility than the single classroom and includes contributing to the school,the system, other students, the wider community, and collective responsibilities ofteachers themselves as a group and the broader profession.

In recent times there have been several initiatives to enhance teacher professional-ism such as the Innovative Links Project and the National Schools Network(NSN).2 These projects are premised on a democratic view of professionalism. Boththese projects do much more than help teachers develop better ways of improvingtheir practice. Preston (1996) referring to the NSN in particular suggests that theseprojects are developing and testing better ways of carrying out research to consolidatethe knowledge base of the teaching profession through close collaboration betweenpractising teachers and academics. The primary aim of school-based teacher inquiryin these projects is to foster understanding and improvement of practice; and to helpteachers to come to know the epistemological bases of their practice (Cochrane-Smith and Lytle 1998, Sachs 1999). Through facilitated research, academics andschool-based practitioners work collaboratively in mutually identified projects.Their focus, their modes of affiliation, forms of documentation and communicationbecome the vehicle for a more inclusive form of teacher professionalism. At the coreof this activity are new forms of reciprocity between teachers and academics andother education stakeholders whereby both groups come to understand the natureand limitations of each other’s work and perspectives . However, Preston (1996: 196)correctly observed that while the Innovative Links project is integrated into theeveryday work of schools, it does not make the same connections with universityeducation faculties. It breaks down the individualism of teachers’ work, but does notdo the same for academics’ work. Here the challenge for academics is how to integratethis kind of work into their work practices and importantly have this kind of profes-sional activity recognized and rewarded within the broader university.

Professional identity

In terms of its orthodox uses, the idea of professional identity is rarely taken as prob-lematic. It is used to refer to a set of externally ascribed attributes that are used to dif-ferentiate one group from another. Professional identity thus is a set of attributes thatare imposed upon the teaching profession either by outsiders or members of the teach-ing fraternity itself. It provides a shared set of attributes, values and so on so that enablethe differentiation of one group from another. From this perspective it is an exclusiverather than inclusive ideal and is conservative rather than radical in its intent.Following Epstein identity is essentially a concept of synthesis, integration and action:

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It represents theprocess by which the person seeks to integrate his (sic) various statuses and roles, as well as hisdiverse experiences, into a coherent image of self (Epstein 1978: 101)

Under current conditions of change, uncertainty and continuous educational restruc-turing managerialist or democratic teacher professional identities emerge out ofwhat Bernstein (1996) refers to as retrospective and prospective identities. The retro-spective identities use as resources narratives of the past that provide exemplars andcriteria for the present and for the future. A sub-set of the retrospective identity, theelitist identity, uses a narrative of the past to provide exemplars, criteria and standardsof conduct. It is an amalgam of knowledge, sensitivities . . . (p. 78). Alternatively, pro-spective identities are essentially future orientated. The may well use and rest uponnarrative resources, but the narrative resources of prospective identity constructionsground the identity in the future. As Bernstein (1996: 79) argues `prospective identi-ties change the basis for collective recognition and relation’. Prospective identities arelaunched by social movements, and are engaged in conversion through their engage-ment with economic and political activity to provide for the development of theirnew potential. These are important points when rethinking the issue of a new teacherprofessional identity. They point to collective action by teachers that is industrial,political and professional. The industrial component comes through the activities ofteacher unions and deals with conditions of work, remuneration and social recogni-tion while at the same time contributing to the professional identity and recognitionof teachers through on-going professional development activities. The EducationAccord between unions and Government in Australia in the early 1990s markedout possibilities for this to happen (see Sachs 1997 and Seddon 1996).3 Finally, it ispolitical, for as Kathleen Casey (1993) argues although the political is everywhere, itis not diffuse, for everyone is involved but not in the same way’ . (p. 158)

In times of rapid change identity cannot be seen to be a fixed thing’, it is nego-tiated, open, shifting, ambiguous, the result of culturally available meanings and theopen-ended power-laden enactment of those meanings in everyday situations(Kondo, 1990: 24). For teachers this is mediated by their own experience in schoolsand outside of schools as well as their own belief s and values about what it means tobe a teacher and the type of teacher they aspire to be.

Wenger (1998: 149) identifies five dimensions of identity, which are useful whenthinking about professional identity. These are: (1) identity as negotiated experienceswhere we define who we are by the ways we experience our selves through participa-tion as well as theway we and others reify our selves. (2) identity as community member-ship where we define who we are by the familiar and the unfamiliar; (3) identity aslearning trajectory where we define who we are by where we have been and where aregoing; (4) identity as nexus of multi membership where we define who we are by theways we reconcile our various forms of identity into one identity; and (5) identity asa relation between the local and the global where we define who we are by negotiatinglocal ways of belonging to broader constellations and manifesting broader styles anddiscourses. These five dimensions of identity have application in developing a revisedview of professional identity for teachers as they address the social, cultural and politi-cal (macro and micro, individual and group) aspects of identity formation. Anyreconceptualized notion of professional identity needs incorporate these characteris-tics. Importantly, identity and practice mirror each other. As Wenger (1998: 149)argues there is a profound connection between identity and practice. Developing apractice requires the formation of a community whose members can engage withone another and thus acknowledge each other as participants’.

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Within the context of uncertainty and multiple educational restructuringsteachers’ professional identity is not straightforward. There would be incongruitiesbetween the defined identity of teachers as proposed by systems, unions and individ-ual teachers themselves and that these will change at various times according to con-textual and individual factors and exigencies. Identity must be forever re-establishedand negotiated. It defines our capacity to speak and act autonomously and allows forthe differentiation of ourselves from those of others while continuing to be the sameperson (Melucci 1996). For teachers this is a challenge given that governments donot see it to be in their best interests to have a vocal and autonomous teaching service.When teachers do act autonomously their behaviour is often sanctioned by theiremploying authorities. Nevertheless the development and sustaining of a strong pro-fessional identity is what distinguishes the expertise of teachers and that differentiatesthem from other workers.

It may well be not very productive to talk about professional identity in an essen-tialized way. Clearly teachers inhabit multiple professional identities. For a primaryschool teacher for example, these might include the general category of primaryteacher. However this can be broken down into further identities by year level, suchas a junior, middle or upper school teacher; a subject or discipline specific teachersuch as special education teacher, music teacher, physical education teacher and soon. These people may see themselves as belonging to the generic category of primaryteacher but also identify with their area of specialization and year level. A similarlogic follows in secondary schools but with more categories for differentiation alongsubject/discipline, year level lines. While any idea of a fixed teacher professional iden-tity is unproductive never the less, it can serve the needs of the State by providing aframework for externally initiated controls. These controls set the limits for whatcan be said about teacher professional identity and at the same time defining whatmust remain unsaid on pain of censure. In such situations teacher professional identityserves bureaucratic purposes, in so far as control of debates about is meaning aretaken from outside the people who live’ it on a daily basis, teachers themselves. Theconditions created by managerialist discourses give rise to and reinforce entrepreneur-ial identities, while democratic discourses provide opportunities for activist identitiesto emerge and flourish. Importantly, as Kathleen Casey’s life history work on teachersreinforces, it is the collective stories rather than the individual stories that provide thepolitical impetus for ongoing action. These stories provide examples of professional-ism in action and professionalism for action.

The entrepreneurial identity

Under the conditions of public sector management reform a new model of profes-sional identity is emerging. This is what Menter et al. (1997) refer to as the entrepre-neurial professional who will identify with the efficient, responsible and accountableversion of service that is currently promulgated. du Gay (1996: 181) observes that`because previously distinct forms of life or modes of conduct are now classified pri-marily, if not exclusively, as ` enterprise forms’ ’ the conceptions and practices of per-sonhood they give rise to are remarkably consistent’ . Thus, there is the emergence ofwhat Catherine Casey (1995) refers to as designer employees’ who are respondingto a broad crisis in industrial production, work organization and culture.

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Bureaucracies too would encourage `designer teachers’ who demonstrate complianceto policy imperatives and perform at high levels of efficiency and effectiveness.

Fergusson (1994) has the following to say regarding the consequences of mana-gerialism for the teaching profession:

The potential impact on the constitution, standing, identity, autonomy and authority of the profession isenormous. The socialisation of intending teachers into the mores, values, understandings of what it meansto be a teacher will switch from being developed in a collective setting of debate informed by theory,research and evidence, to one in which socialization is entirely dependent on two or three teachers. Newteachers’ capacities to act autonomously work independently and most of all mount well-grounded chal-lenges to managerial diktat are likely to diminish, and their sense of membership and solidarity of a largerbody to be diluted (pp. 106± 107).

Menter et al. (1997) go on to add that judgement about priorities, appropriateness andefficacy, once the preserve of the expert, guided by rules and precedent, is ignored orexcluded’ (p. 57). The revision of teacher professionalism across the public sector hasvery significant consequences for both teachers’ work and teacher professional iden-tity.

Under managerialist discourses the market will play an important part in howteachers constitute their professional identity collectively and individually.Competition for reduced resources between schools gives rise to a competitiveethos, rather than a collaborative one. The efficient operation of the market is fosteredthrough the combination of legislative controls and internal, institutional mechan-isms, notably performance indicators and inspections, which ostensibly provide con-sumers with a basis for selection but more importantly provide managerialimperatives (Menter et al. 1997: 64). The rise of the teacher professional standardsmovement in the UK, USA and Australia can be seen to be more concerned withstandardization of practice rather than quality, despite a public rhetoric for the latter.

New Zealand is a case in point where managerialism and marketization charac-terized education policy and practice during the late 1980s until the present.Standardized measures of performance enable schools to be ranked by their cus-tomers, market competition penalized non-conformity in teaching and learning andthe national curriculum functioned as a system of cultural control, a standardised lan-guage, a narrativehistory of national destiny, so a normative, monocultural definitionof community claiming the legitimacy of familiar values and an external identity’(Marginson 1997: 190).

In the UK, the intention of the New Right policies in education are aimed atremoving costs and responsibilities as a means of raising standards from the state andthus improving efficiency and responsiveness as a means of raising standards of per-formance. Putting education into the market place means making education appearmore like a commodity so that parents are given access to a range of products fromwhich they can select . In this framework, schools become more efficient in responseto competition (Menter et al. 1997: 26).

Under managerialist conditions a cult of individualism would re-infect the occu-pational culture of teachers. This individualism develops in response to teachers work-ing conditions is characterized by isolation and privacy. As Andy Hargreaves (1994)observes individualism is primarily a shortcoming, not a strength, not a possibility;something to be removed rather than something to be respected’ (p. 171).Individualism is in stark contrast to collaboration and collegiality that are the corner-stones democratic discourses and the development of an activist professional identity.The entrepreneurial identity then has the following features:

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. individualistic

. competitive

. controlling and regulative

. externally defined

The activist identity

An activist identity emerging from democratic discourses has clear emancipatoryaims. The conditions for democratic schools are best described by Beane and Appleand are set out below. Under these conditions an activist identity has opportunitiesto emerge. They include inter alia:

. The open flow of ideas, regardless of their popularity, that enables people tobe as fully informed as possible.

. Faith in the individual and collective capacity of people to create possibilitiesfor resolving problems.

. The use of critical reflection and analysis to evaluate ideas, problems andpolicies.

. Concern for the welfare of others and the common good’.

. Concern for the dignity and rights of individuals and minorities.

. An understanding that democracy is not so much an ideal’ to be pursued as anidealized ’ set of values that we must live and that must guide our life aspeople.

. The organization of social institutions to promote and extend the democraticway of life. (Beane and Apple 1995: 6± 7)

First and foremost democratic schools and an activist identity are concerned to reduceor eliminate exploitation, inequality and oppression. Accordingly the developmentof this identity is deeply rooted in principles of equity and social justice. These arenot only for the teaching profession but also for a broader education constituency ofparents and students.

Earlier I suggested that a revised professional identity requires a new form of pro-fessionalism and engagement. Redefining teacher professional identity as an activistidentity involves two main elements; the effort to shed the shackles of the past,thereby permitting a transformative attitude towards the future; and second, the aimof overcoming the illegitimate domination of some individuals or groups over others.

In order to achieve this I suggest two strategies, each is interconnected with theother. First, the teaching profession at the individual and collective level shouldacknowledge the importance of professional self-narratives (Gergen and Gergen1988). These are culturally provided stories about selves and their passage throughlives that provide resources drawn upon by individuals in their interactions with oneanother and with themselves. For Gergen and Gergen

narratives are, in effect, social constructions, undergoing continuous alteration as interaction progresses . . .the self-narrative is a linguistic implement constructed by people in relationships to sustain, enhance orimpede various actions. Self-narratives are symbolic systems used for such social purposes as justification,criticism and social solidification (1988: 20± 21).

The teachers themselves construct these self-narratives, and they relate to their social,political and professional agendas. These self-narratives are stories of stories, they arereflexive in that they are understood both by the individual and by others. For

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teachers these self-narratives are often tacit, they operate at the level of the taken-for-granted. They are developed during their own schooling and then embedded andreinforced in the course of the professional lives in schools and so on.

These self-narratives provide a glue for a collective professional identity and pro-vide a provocation for renewing teacher professionalism. It is important that storiesare made public, not necessarily in a written sense but at least shared so they are com-municated in a way that can be shared, debated and contested by others. I suggestthat making these narratives public is a source for lively professional development. Itprovides opportunities for teachers to communicate with each other about whatthey think schooling, education, subject knowledge, pedagogy and so on is about.Furthermore it gives rise to a more active, spirited debate about policy and practice.Critical self-narratives about professional identity at the individual and collectivelevel have clear emacipatory objectives. These objectives, I suggest are towards anactivist stance and the development of an activist identity. Elsewhere (Sachs 1998,2000) I have identified a protocol for an activist professional and described the con-ditions that would help facilitate its development.

Democratic discourses give rise to the development of communities of practice.These communities of practice are not self-contained entities. They develop in largercontexts ± historical, social, cultural, institutional ± with specific reference to resourcesand constraints. Some of these conditions and requirements are explicitly articulated.Some are implicit but no less binding (Wenger 1998: 79). Within these communitiesthere are various levels and degrees of expertise that should be seen as a shared set ofprofessional resources. They require sustained engagement, and at the same timedemand the development and negotiation of shared meanings. They are not intrinsi-cally beneficial or harmful. Nor are they not privileged in terms of positive or nega-tive effects. They are a force to be reckoned with. Wenger (1998: 85) argues: as alocus of engagement in action, interpersonal relations, shared knowledge, and nego-tiation of enterprises, such communities hold the key to real transformation ± thekind that has real effects on people’ s lives’. Communities of practice that articulatearound issues of professional practice can have profound impacts on teachers’ lives.

Core dimensions of in the operation of these communities of practice is the workof engagement and imagination. The former requires the ability to take part in mean-ingful activities and interactions, in the production of sharable artifacts, in com-munity-building conversations, and in the negotiation of new situations (Wenger1998: 184). The latter requires the ability to disengage. The work of engagementand imagination is fundamental to the development of an activist professional iden-tity. Both provide the structural and affective conditions for the role of teacher activistto be legitimated, recognized and practiced. Wenger (1998: 185) suggests that imagin-ation needs:

the willingness, freedom, energy and time to expose ourselves to the exotic, move around, try new identi-ties, and explore new relations. It requires the ability to proceed without being too quick within the con-straints of a specific form of accountability, to accept non-participation as an adventure, and to suspendjudgment

Communities of practice provide the context and conditions for teachers to developan activist identity. They facilitate values of respect, reciprocity and collaboration.Communities of practice and an activist identity are coextensive, each nourishes andsupports the other. These values cannot exist in isolation, nor without a purpose.The purpose is to revitalize teachers’ sense of themselves professionally and personally.Importantly this is to be achieved individually and collectively, from inside as well

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as outsideof the profession. Communities of practice provide opportunities for this tooccur that are strategic and well as practical.

The search for a new identity could be interpreted as an attempt to change thepublic perception of the role and purpose of teachers and teaching. Teachers, bureau-crats, unions, academics and others are attempting to adopt new professional identitiesat a stage when public policies and debates about schooling and teacher professional-ism are under close scrutiny. The challenge for those of us involved in the broaderpolitical project of revitalizing issues of teacher professionalism and professional iden-tity is how to facilitate public debate about thenatureof teaching. This means address-ing issues such as dealing with the challenges of working under conditions of rapidchange, ambiguity and uncertainty, while at the same time having a clear and articu-lated sense of what it means to be a teacher in contemporary society.

Conclusion

In this paper I have identified two discourses, which I argue havedominated educationpolicy and practice in recent times. I have suggested that these discourses and theassumptions that inform them give rise to two quite distinct forms of teacher identity.The managerialist discourse gives rise to an entrepreneurial identity in which themarket and issues of accountability, economy, efficiency and effectiveness shapehow teachers individually and collectively construct their professional identities.Democratic discourses, which are in distinct contrast to the managerialist ones giverise to an activist professional identity in which collaborative cultures are an integralpart of teachers’ work practices. These democratic discourses provide the conditionsfor the development of communities of practice. They are primarily concerned withengaging with some enterprise but also in figuring out how this engagement fits inthe broader scheme of things (Wenger 1998). These communities of practice are colle-gial, negotiated and they form and reform around specific issues. Notwithstandingthis, there is a need to defend some of the older identities. Sometimes the call for the`new’ can act in ways that support managerialism as it sees itself as new’. Hence thecreation of professional identities builds on, rather than rejects previous notions,accordingly, it requires a form of reflexivity when what has come previously is useda resource to build upon.

New times and conditions require alternative forms of teacher professionalismand teacher identities to develop. Furlong et al. (2000: 175) suggest:

that we need to ask some fundamental questions about who does have a legitimate right to be involved indefining teaching professionalism. Are state control and market forces or professional self governance reallythe only models of accountability available to us ± or can wedevelop new approaches to teacher profession-alism, based upon more participatory relationships with diverse communities?

The search for a new identity sometimes assumes such an identity already exists andwants to be discovered. This may be correct only if the new identity is to be writtenby someone else (Czarniawska 1997). If the teaching profession wants to be the authorof its own identity or professional narrative then now is possibly the time for this tooccur. There is now some evidence suggesting that the market is no longer the appro-priate metaphor nor structure in which education policies and practices develop.Under more democratic conditions, where teacher knowledge and expertise is recog-nized and rewarded, an activist teacher professional identity gives rise to new formsof public and professional engagement by teachers themselves and the broader popu-

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lation. Activist teacher professional identity gives rise to new forms of association ofteachers among themselves and others. It gives rise to new work practices and moreflexible ways thinking about practice.

Teachers’ professional identities are rich and complex because they are producedin a rich and complex set of relations of practice (Wenger 1998, p. 162). This richnessand complexity needs to be nurtured and developed in conditions where there isrespect, mutuality and communication. An activist teacher professional identity isnot something that will come naturally to all teachers. It has to be negotiated, livedand practiced. The development of such an identity will be a challenge for many,and will be challenged by others, but once its elements are learned and communicatedto others it will make a significant contribution to teachers’ work and how theyexperience that work in the eyes of themselves and others.

Notes

1. I acknowledge that there are problems associated with using binary oppositions, in particular the simplificationof complex ideas into convenient couplets. Nevertheless, for the purposes of this paper these two identities anddiscourses at one level do appear to be oppositional. However, we should be cognisant of how managerial dis-courses are seeking to redefine and reconfigure democracy such that democracy is no longer a social project butrather an economic one. (See Apple 1993)

2. The NSN is a reform network which involves over 200 schools across primary, secondary, state, catholic andindependent sectors in all Australian states. All schools associated with the NSN are bound together by a com-mon set of principles, ideas and ideals that are based on the question `what is it about the way schools are organ-ized that gets in the way of student learning?’ The Innovative Links project has provided the opportunity for14 universities, across 16 campuses, representing all Australian states and one territory to be involved in a projectthat has as its core feature the idea of partnerships between practicing teachers on a whole school basis and univer-sity based teacher educators. This is approximately one third of universities in Australia involved in a coherentteacher professional development project. Added to this are some 100 schools, which include state, independent,catholic representatives and some 80 academic associates. See Sachs 1997, Reclaiming the Agenda of TeacherProfessionalism: an Australian experience Journal of Education for Teaching, 23 (3) for more detail about these pro-jects.

3. In Australia the project of reclaiming teacher professionalism had its antecedents in industrial and professionalactivities during the later 1980s and early 1990s. Specifically award restructuring at the federal level providedthe impetus for school reform and the promise for teacher professionalism. The necessary ideological conditionswithin teaching and outside it were created to facilitate debate about the scope and nature of teacherprofessionalism. The Teaching Accord of 1993 constituted a tangible recognition of the fundamental roleteachers must play in thedevelopment of theprofession. TheTeaching Accord established priorities and detailedthe commitment of the Commonwealth to the involvement of the profession and its financial support for pro-fessional development, curriculum assessment and research projects with seed funding for national teacher pro-fessional development projects.

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