Management through pedagogy

Since 2015, the French-speaking Belgian compulsory education system has been involved in a comprehensive reform plan called the Pact for Teaching Excellence. The Pact of Excellence introduces a new form of institutional regulation based on a contractual relationship between the competent public authority and schools. Based on the model of the cities of Boltanski and Thevenot (1991) and a lexicographical analysis of official documents, this article examines, from a historical perspective, the progressive introduction of the new logic of coordination of the work of the actors of the educational system. It demonstrates that the regulation of the educational system is based on managerial logic that is particularly compatible with certain pedagogical principles.