The Accountability of Private vs. Public Governance 'by Information': A Comparison of the Assessment Activities of the OECD and the IEA in the Field of Education
Rivista Trimestrale di Diritto Pubblico, Vol. 58, No. 1, pp. 41-69, 2008
23 Pages Posted: 11 Feb 2009
Date Written: October 1, 2007
Abstract
This paper challenges the thesis that there is an increasing privatization in global governance and that private and public forms of global governance are often equivalent and even indistinguishable. Instead, it is argued that public forms of global governance may serve as a role model for private forms of governance.
Analyzing two different regimes of "governance by information", the PISA student assessment by the OECD, a public international organization, and the TIMSS assessment by the IEA, a hybrid educational assessment organization, it is shown how the IEA, though having been active in the field for a longer time, had to adapt to the institutional and procedural standards set by the OECD. It is assumed that this was at least partly due to the superior accountability and legitimacy of the PISA regime. The legal framework of PISA therefore deserve to be elaborated and hypostasized as a specific standard instrument in international institutional law.
Keywords: Global Administrative Law, PISA, OECD, IEA, TIMSS, Education, Global Governance, International Organisation, International Law, International Institutional Law, accountability
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