Teachers' work in the era of digital governance: a qualitative study
Abstract
The emergence of digital technologies and the implementation of digital governance in the educational system raise important challenges for teachers. In this scenario, this paper is intended to answer the following question: are digital governance reinventing teachers’ work? The study is based on a qualitative multi-case analysis in 4 schools in Spain, within the framework of a funded research project, carried out through interviews with teachers and students, discussion groups with families and participant observation in classrooms. The results suggest that the implementation of digital platforms and the logic of governance that accompanies them, are causing significant transformations in teachers’ work, reflected in four dimensions: the dissolution of teaching functions, the delegation of responsibilities, the fragmentation and intensification of tasks and the focus on productivity and goal attainment from a technical and deregulated perspective.
Downloads
-
Abstract142
-
PDF74
References
Antunes, F., & Viseu, S. (2019). Education Governance and Privatization in Portugal: Media Coverage on Public and Private Education. Education Policy Analysis Archives/Archivos Analíticos de Políticas Educativas, 27(125). https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.27.4293
Awidi, I.T., & Paynter, M. (2024). An Evaluation of the Impact of Digital Technology Innovations on Students’ Learning: Participatory Research Using a Student-Centred Approach. Technology, Knowledge and Learning, 29, 65–89. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10758-022-09619-5
Ball, S. J. (2015). Education, governance and the tyranny of numbers. Journal of Education Policy, 30(3), 299–301. https://doi.org/10.1080/02680939.2015.1013271
Ball, S. J., & Youdell, D. (2007). Hidden Privatisation in Public Education. Education International.
Blikstein, P. (2018). Maker movement in education: History and prospects. En M. J. de Vries (Ed.), Handbook of technology education (pp. 419–437). Sense Publishers. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44687-5_33
Cappello, G. (2022). The Platformization and Commodification of Italian Schools during the Covid-19 Crisis. In M. Colombo, M. Romito, M. Vaira y M. Visentin (Eds.), Education and Emergency in Italy. How the Education System Reacted to the First Wave of Covid-19 (pp. 219-237). Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004523234_010
Chalkiadakis, L., & Noguera, I. (2024). K-12 Teacher’s Appropriation of Digital Technologies and Innovative Instruction Across EU: A Scoping Review. International Journal of Instruction, 17(1), 415–436.
Chiappe, A., Ternent, A., Wills, A., & Restrepo, I. (2020). La educación del siglo XXI y el despertar de las bellas durmientes: una revisión sistemática de la literatura. Education in the Knowledge Society, 21(15). https://doi.org/10.14201/eks.22483
Collins, H. J., Glover, H., & Myers, F. (2022). Behind the digital curtain: a study of academic identities, liminalities and labour market adaptations for the ‘Uberisation’ of HE. Teaching in Higher Education, 27(2), 201-216. https://doi.org/10.1080/13562517.2019.1706163
Erkut, B. (2020). From Digital Government to Digital Governance: Are We There Yet? Sustainability, 12(3), 860. https://doi.org/10.3390/su12030860
Fávero, A. A., & Bechi, D. (2020). A subjetivação capitalista enquanto mecanismo de precarização do trabalho docente na educação superior. Arquivos Analíticos de Políticas Educativas, 28(13). https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.28.4891
Fontana, A., & Prokos, A. H. (2016). The Interview: from Formal to Postmodern. Routledge.
Franco-Santos, M., Nalick, M., Rivera-Torres, P., & Gomez-Mejia, L. (2017). Governance and Well-being in academia: Negative consequences of applying an agency theory logic in higher education. British Journal of Management, 28(4), 711–730. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8551.12249
Gibbs, G. (2012). El análisis de los datos cualitativos en Investigación Cualitativa. Morata.
Gunter, H., & Fitzgerald, T. (2013). New Public Management and the modernisation of education systems. Journal of Educational Administration and History, 45(3), 213–219. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220620.2013.796914
Hase, A., & Kuhl, P. (2024). Teachers’ use of data from digital learning platforms for instructional design: a systematic review. Educational technology research and development. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11423-024-10356-y
Lara, A. L. (2018). Facework: trabajo digital, redes sociales y nueva servidumbre. Sociología del trabajo, 93, 159–180. https://doi.org/10.5209/STRA.61795
López Rupérez, F., García García, I., & Expósito Casas, E. (2017). La calidad de la gobernanza del sistema educativo español. Un estudio empírico. Universidad Camilo José Cela.
Maniglio, F. (2017). El discurso tecnopolítico de la gobernanza europea: un análisis crítico del discuso (ACD) de las políticas post-Lisboa. Araucaria. Revista Iberoamericana de Filosofía, Política y Humanidades, 19(37), 327–351. https://doi.org/10.12795/araucaria.2017.i37.16
Manoharan, A.P., Melitski, J., & Holzer, M. (2023). Digital Governance: An Assessment of Performance and Best Practices. Public Organization Review, 23, 265–283. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11115-021-00584-8
Mountford, N., & Geiger, S. (2020). Duos and duels in field evolution: How governments and interorganizational networks relate. Organization Studies, 41(4), 499–522. https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840618789210
Noll, H. (2019). ¡Es taylorismo, estúpido! Sobre la nueva organización científica de la investigación y la docencia en la Universidad Española. Sociología del trabajo, 95, 1–18. https://doi.org/10.5209/stra.66436
OECD/CERI, (2015). Governing Complex Education Systems (GCES). http://www.oecd.org/education/ceri/gces.htm
Ortega, A. (2019). Gobernanza digital: ¿Hacia una nueva utopía? Telos, 110, 1–10. https://telos.fundaciontelefonica.com/telos-110-autor-invitado-gobernanza-digital-hacia-una-nueva-utopia/
Parcerisa, L., & Verger, A. (2016). Rendición de cuentas y política educativa: Una revisión de la evidencia internacional y futuros retos para la investigación. Profesorado. Revista de Currículum y Formación del Profesorado, 20(3), 15-51.
Pardo Baldoví, M. I., & San Martín Alonso, Á. (2020). Tecnologías y cultura organizativa en los centros escolares. ¿La uberización de las relaciones laborales? Technologies and organizational culture in schools. The labor relations’ uberization?. Píxel-Bit. Revista De Medios Y Educación, 58, 161-179. https://doi.org/10.12795/pixelbit.72767
Pardo Baldoví, M. I., Marín Suelves, D., & Vidal Esteve, M. I. (2022). Prácticas docentes en la escuela digital: la inclusión como reto. Revista Latinoamericana De Tecnología Educativa – RELATEC, 21(1), 43-55. https://doi.org/10.17398/1695-288X.21.1.43
Pérez Gómez, Á. I. (2019). Ser docente en tiempos de incertidumbre y perplejidad. Márgenes. Revista de educación de la Universidad de Málaga. 0(0), 3–17. https://doi.org/10.24310/mgnmar.v0i0.6497
Pink, S., Horst, H., Postill, J., Hjorth, L., Lewis, T., & Tacchi, J. (2019). Etnografía digital. Principios y práctica. Morata.
Roberts-Holmes, G. (2015). The ‘datafication’ of early years pedagogy: ‘if the teaching is good, the data should be good and if there’s bad teaching, there is bad data’. Journal of Education Policy, 30(3), 302–315. https://doi.org/10.1080/02680939.2014.924561
Ruiz Domínguez, M. Á., & Area Moreira, M. (2021). La transferencia del conocimiento en la red. Análisis del portal educativo Yo Soy Tu Profe. EDUTEC. Revista Electrónica De Tecnología Educativa, 76, 159-180. https://doi.org/10.21556/edutec.2021.76.1917
Santori, D. (2016). Public narratives under intensified market conditions: Chile as a critical case. Discourse Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 39(2), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/01596306.2016.1229267
Saura, G. (2020). Filantrocapitalismo digital en educación: Covid-19, UNESCO, Google, Facebook y Microsoft. Teknokultura. Revista de Cultura Digital y Movimientos Sociales, 17, 159-168. https://doi.org/10.5209/tekn.69547
Stake, R. E. (1995). The Art of Case Study Research. SAGE.
Touraine, A. (1993). Crítica de la modernidad. Temas de hoy.
Vuopala, E., Guzmán Medrano, D., Aljabaly, M., Hietavirta, D., Malacara, L., & Pan, C. (2020). Implementing a maker culture in elementary school – students’ perspectives. Technology, Pedagogy and Education, 29(5), 649-664. https://doi.org/10.1080/1475939X.2020.1796776
Williamson, B. (2019). El futuro del currículum. La educación y el conocimiento en la era digital. Morata.
Yelicich, C. (2019). La dirección escolar colonizada: el mundo empresarial en la escuela. In A. de Melo, I. J. Espinosa, L. Pons & J. I. Rivas (Eds.), Perspectivas decoloniales sobre la educación (pp.213–244). Málaga: UMA Editorial.
Copyright (c) 2025 Servicio de Publicaciones de la Universidad de Murcia

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Original work publishes in this journal is subject to the following terms:
1. Murcia University Press (the publishing house) holds the copyright of the publishes work, and favours and allows their reutilization under the use license stated in point 2.
© Servicio de Publicaciones, Universidad de Murcia, 2015
2. Work is published in the electronic edition under a license (Creative Commons Reconocimiento-NoComercial-SinObraDerivada 4.0 España (legal text). They can be copied, used, disseminated, transmitted and publicly presented, as long as: i) authorship and original publication source is acknowledged (journal, publishing house and URL of the work); ii) are not used for commercial purposes; iii) the existence and specifications of this use license is stated.
3. Conditions for self-archive. Authors are allowed and encouraged to disseminate electronically the pre-pint (before review) and/or post-print (accepted for publication) versions of their work before their publication since that favours earlier circulation and dissemination resulting in an increased chance for the authors to be cited and for the work to reach a bigger share of the academic community. Colour: RoMEO: green.





