This paper aims at understanding the process of teachers’ disempowerment starting at the beginning of the 20^th century until today. The shift of education research from a reflexive and experimental discipline to an applied science was at the basis of large educational reforms that included changes in the role of teachers. Based on the analysis of two large reforms of the Israeli education systems in 1968 (structural reform) and in 2004 (managerial reform), our study shows the increasing de-professionalisation of teachers. The Israeli case is far from being unique and reflects a world tendency influenced by education models that are encouraged by international organizations and circulate across countries. 

In the early decades of the 20^th century in the United States, and after WWII in Europe, the social sciences were mobilized for policy-making purposes and for the redesign of societal institutions in need of modernization. Institutions dealing with education - universities and national institutes - played a major role in the reshaping of society (Wittrock et al 1991). The modern school developed since the 19^th century as a system of social administration concerned with the production of the citizen, who could act within the new political and cultural institutions as a self-regulated and self-disciplined person. Policy, curriculum and educational research are constructed as systems of knowledge for the social administration of teachers and children, through the administration of the self (Popkewitz 1991, 1997).  

 In the United States scientific pedagogies were a part of the rapidly growing American universities to aid in the new role of social and cultural management (Powell 1980). The scientification of education developed in American universities pervaded international organizations, mainly, UNESCO and the OECD, and became the new model of research on education. This model was diffused in Europe and around the world. These new models of educational research based on quantitative analyses incorporated social and economic factors (economic growth based on human capital theories) in their studies (Resnik 2006).

How does the scientification of education influence the teaching profession and their professional autonomy?

The first stage of this study focuses on the scientification of education on Israel. It is through the case of curriculum planning, the advent of professional planners and the creation of the new department of Curriculum Planning at the Ministry of Education (1964) that we analyze the transition from pedagogical to academic knowledge in curriculum development in Israel.

The second stage of the study focuses on the transformation of the teaching teachers’ role following two main reforms in Israel (1988, 2004). Changes in teachers’ conditions are related to educational reforms aiming at the “social administration” of teachers and children through the administration of the self, shaping their dispositions, sensibilities and capabilities (Popkewitz 1994, 1997).  For this reason, the transformations of teachers’ conditions in Israel are presented as part of the structural reform (1968) and the managerial reform (2004). The structural reform aimed at equalizing educational opportunities between Mizrahi and Ashkenazi children by prolonging compulsory education and the creation of middle high schools (age 12-15). The managerial reform aimed at overcoming the “Interstate achievement gap” based on PISA low results of Israeli students by improving the quality of education of the whole population, Arabs and ultra-orthodoxes included. Both reforms were formulated based on human capital theories similar to policies recommended by international organizations, UNESCO and OECD and since the 1990s also the World Bank.

Callon, Michel and Latour, Bruno 1992 Do not Throw out the Baby with the Bath School,”.in Science as Practice and Culture, ed. A. Pickering, Chicago: Chicago University Press Hargreaves, Andy 2000 Four Ages of Professionalism and Professional Learning. Teachers and Teaching: theory and practice, 6, 2: 151-182 Popkewitz, Thomas S. 1997 A Changing Terrain of Knowledge and Power: A Social Epistemology of Educational Research, Educational Researcher, 26, 9: 18-29. Popkewitz, Thomas S. 1994 Professionalization in teaching and teacher education: Some notes on its history, ideology, and potential. Teaching and teacher education, 10,1:1-14. Powell, A.G. 1980 The Uncertain Profession: Harvard and the Search for Educational Authority. Cambridge, Mass., Cambridge University Press. Resnik, J. 2006 International Organizations, the ‘Education-Economic Growth’ Black Box, and the Development of World Education Culture". Comparative Education Review, 50, 2: 173-195. Wittrock, Bjorn, Wagner, Peter and Hollman, Helmut 1991 “Social Sciences and the Modern State: Policy Knowledge and Political Institutions in Western Europe and the United States” in P. Wagner, C. H. Weiss, B. Wittrock and H. Wollmann (eds.), Social Sciences and Modern States. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 28-85.