Making Room for or Getting Involved into? Meanings of Participation among Two Chilean Inclusive Policies

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.4067/S0718-73782021000100189

Keywords:

Inclusion; Public policy; Participation; Discourse; Education

Abstract

This article presents the discourse analysis of two inclusive-education Chilean policies – the Decree 170/2010 which “Establishes several criteria in order to determine whether students with Special Educational Needs are Special Education grant eligibility” and Decree 83/2015 which “Approves Curriculum Adaptation criteria and orientations for Special Educational Needs pre-school and elementary school students” – in order to identify the specific meanings of participation as the inclusive modality takes within both of theme and considered part of a whole inclusive discourse. Based on some principles and procedures given by the Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) – a set of analysis techniques, inclusive policies address discursive operations that distribute hierarchies, relevancies and focuses that reframes the participation idea which ends up embodying based on what inclusive policy finally remarks in this case. Furthermore, results underline a destitution operation that relegates participation to a secondary place, taking away and replacing its original meaning – the one that moves the inclusive process alongside with other educative key criteria such as learning. This position and outcome gets particular relevance when inclusive parameters are taken into account, as a part of a rational speech embodying inclusion within school debates, conditioning what this aspiration addresses as a democratic horizon in Chilean educational policy.

Author Biography

Claudio Herrera, Universidad Bernardo O’Higgins

Psicólogo clínico de la Universidad de Santiago de Chile, Magister en Psicología, mención Psicología Social de la Universidad Diego Portales. Con trayectoria profesional vinculada al ámbito educativo como parte del Programa de Integración Escolar, y actualmente desde el trabajo como docente semi-presencial a tiempo parcial en la Universidad UNIACC, y como docente asociado en la Universidad Bernardo O’Higgins desde la especialidad Social y Comunitaria aplicada a la formación en pregrado de las carreras de Trabajo Social y Psicología, sus líneas de investigación actuales incluyen la escuela y sus lógicas programáticas, las políticas educativas, los métodos cualitativos de investigación, las modalidades de intervención social y los estudios discursivos

Published

2021-05-15

How to Cite

Herrera, C. (2021). Making Room for or Getting Involved into? Meanings of Participation among Two Chilean Inclusive Policies. Latin American Journal of Inclusive Education, 15(1), 189–205. https://doi.org/10.4067/S0718-73782021000100189