Leading as radicalism under the long shadow of Gove's School Desk

Michael Gove is a controversial figure, not least due to his time as secretary of state for education under the Cameron coalition government from 2009 to 2013. Gove’s internationalising policy claimed to be addressing the attainment gap between rich and poor, supporting a workforce for the global markets. Gove appealed to all educational leaders by sending them a Gove-signed King James Bible, and he set up a Victorian school desk as the primary display artefact in the Ministry of Education. These two artefacts provide the analytical lens from which the claims and consequences of Gove’s education policy reforms were experienced by educational leaders and schools. This chapter aligns with the editorial line of this book in three ways. First, it acknowledges context as the most important aspect of understanding reform, in this case the neoliberal market economy of Britain in the 21st century. Second, it affords insight into how the selective use of data and political rhetoric acted as a vehicle for power in and through social relations. Finally, it reveals where disadvantage lies and provides impetus for further research and scholarship to mitigate it.