The OECD Programme for International Student Assessment

The OECD PISA: Unraveling a Knowledge Network traces the construction of an international student assessment by the Organzation for International Co-operation and Development (OECD). The PISA is analyzed within the context of the global architecture of education where various agents such as the OECD and other international organizations, states and communities of experts are reconstructing, reproducing and legitimizing the discourse and material practices of societal and economic progress. The book argues that the PISA is a fragile entity. It is susceptible to contestation not only as it is located in a highly politicized setting, the OECD, but also because it is founded on the socially-constructed science of educational measurement. This research work reveals that the international educational indicators that inform public policy decision-making are the result of a series of negotiated compromises made by communities of practice occupying various institutional structures within the global architecture of education.