In this paper, we propose to analyse and to discuss the emergence of Portuguese think tanks, their organization, characteristics and affirmation process in the public sphere, and their role in shaping Portuguese education policy. Existing categorisations (e.g., Hart & Vromen, 2008; McGann & Weaver, 2000; Medvetz, 2012) commonly distinguish between academic, government, advocacy, contract, and policy types/political party. We understand, here, the term think tank as suggested by Thompson, Savage and Lingard (2015), manifesting a variety of different characteristics and attributes that are constantly evolving in response to changing political conditions. Our analysis frames the work of Portuguese think tanks in relation to the change in governance structures, that is, considering that policy processes involve new ways of thinking about the production and distribution of knowledge, and new actors, including private actors (Hogan , Sellar, & Lingard, 2015; Robertson & Dale, 2008), whose presence would be justified by the opportunities created by new forms of outsourcing, contracting and the setting up of public-private partnerships, that is, the privatization of politics. In this context, the network has been pointed out by several authors (e.g., Menashy & Verger, 2019; Olmedo, 2013; Shiroma, 2013) as an adequate conceptual device to represent the major ongoing changes in the governance of education, and an analysis technique able to visually portray the network of relations of these new policy communities that, among other key actors, include experts, philanthropists, consultants, think tanks and foundations. As Menashy and Verger (2019) pointed out:
The concept of networks is both theoretical and analytical, allowing us to understand major ongoing changes in the governance of education. Networks – conceived as sets of relationships between political, economic and/or social actors – are key in understanding how current policies are formulated and delivered. (Menashy & Verger, 2019, p.127)
On the other hand, as noted by Verger, Fontdevila and Zancajo (2016), the space occupied in the definition of policies by non-state actors has been captured by different concepts: para-political sphere, heterarchies, where processes of decision making are shared at different instances by old and new actors (Olmedo, 2013), or, political subsystem, including public and private actors, in addition to policy analysts, researchers and journalists, usually associated with the creation and/or dissemination of educational policy ideas.
Regarding the think tanks' capacity for political influence, Stone (2000) argued that their ability to determine the political agenda, if any, is intangible while, on the other hand, Ball and Exely (2010), suggested that what happens is, perhaps, a process of friction and infiltration, with versions or traces of ideas that end up being supported in official policy documents.
In this paper, we situate the capacity of Portuguese think tanks to influence the setting of the education policy within the framework of the communication model proposed by Habermas (1997, 2006); model mediated by a reticulated structure (the public sphere), that links a decision-making centre (where the parliamentary system and the political actors are included, both as co-authors and receivers of public opinions) and a periphery with a capacity to exert influence. The periphery, in turn, branches itself into multiple partial public spheres, which overlap and are connected by the porosity of their limits, specialised by their functional content and distributed through levels according to, and simultaneously, density, range of communication produced by the actors and by the organisational complexity that is intrinsic to them (Habermas, 1997, 2006).
