Changing conditions of work in neoliberal times: How the NSW Teachers’ Federation has responded to changes in teachers’ industrial and professional working conditions in NSW public education, 1985-2017

Abstract

Despite decades of neoliberal reform transforming teachers’ work, the NSW Teachers’ Federation (NSWTF) remains the voice of teachers in the public education system of New South Wales, Australia. This thesis argues that the NSWTF has effectively exercised strategic choice in response to neoliberal education reform through building organisational capacity and activating strategic leverage to protect and advance teachers’ industrial and professional conditions of work. Eleven key disputes/campaigns are analysed relating to teachers’ salaries, professional status, staffing entitlements, assessment of performance, professional development, and investment in public education. Extensive document analysis was undertaken for the period 1985 to 2017. These were supplemented by 71 interviews with NSWTF officials and rank-and-file members, ministers for education, leaders of principals’ organisations, and senior leaders of the education department. A model of teacher union effectiveness is developed which draws upon the concepts of organisational capacity and strategic leverage. Through applying this model, building organisational capacity (via recruitment, developing grassroots structures, building democracy, and ensuring financial security and sustainability) is found to be essential for strengthening union power. In examining strategic leverage, this study finds that while ‘resistance’ and ‘rapprochement’ approaches (Carter et al. 2010), characterised by industrial militancy and efforts to achieve gains within neoliberal constraints, respectively, were once commonplace and generally successful strategies for the NSWTF, the contemporary neoliberal context has diminished their effectiveness. Teacher unions may reap more reward by embracing ‘renewal’ strategies (Carter et al. 2010) aimed at greater union-government cooperation, ‘professionalisation’ agendas, presenting counter-narratives to neoliberal discourses, and leveraging support from parents and the education community.