Rethinking Education Reform in Morocco Beyond the Imperatives of Determinism

Abstract

The deterministic tradition abides by the principles of intuitionistic logic, in which the current state of all systems is determined by prior versions of what they are. Systemic determinism, where the present simultaneously substantiates pre-existing conditions and predicts imminent realities, has long championed the logic of the natural sciences, providing substance and legitimacy for an infallible cause-effect agency. Advocacy for deterministic agency is well sensed in the organization and administration of education. Many educational reforms are conceived with practices that espouse the logic of linear progression. The intent of this paper is to interrogate the legitimacy of the deterministic approach to educational reform in Morocco against its capacity to predict change. In particular, the outputs from five educational reforms carried out in Morocco over the 1999-2022 period were subjected to content analysis for obtaining data on the statistical distribution of changes in relation to three research dimensions: access to primary education, adult literacy and gender equality . In a later stage, the outputs from the quantitative analysis were optimized to enable inferential modes of analysis. The findings from this study revealed that systemic determinism is incapacitated by the principle of cause-effect agency that hyperbolizes the influences of the past on the imperatives of the present.

Received: 25 October 2022 / Accepted: 24 February 2022 / Published: 6 March 2023