Rethinking Our Embrace of Decolonization: A Slippery Slope Leading to Nationalist Ideologies and Agendas

Over the past decade, the popularity of authoritarian governments and/or authoritarian leaning leaders has steadily grown. Much of the acceptance of and/or allegiance to such forms of leadership and governance structures stems from a rightward shift among voting blocs, who are increasingly comfortable with nationalist, nativist, and insular arguments in an effort to ensure a sense of stability and safety. In scholarly circles, there has been a parallel rise with scholars increasingly using decolonial theories, research, and practices in an effort to destabilize norms of colonial, Western, and patriarchal knowledge creation and dissemination. These two movements might, on the outside, appear to be disconnected but are in fact coupled together in ways that can constrain progressive movements around human rights, education and justice. The paper frames a selection of political battles in education to highlight the emergence, journey, and outcomes that have led to the successful rise of right-wing ideologies in education as well as offer a critique on the ambiguity inherent in decolonial theories that impede current decolonizing ways of knowing. These ambiguities exacerbate the emergence of a neo-decolonial perspective. This exploration of a neo-decolonial narrative is predicated on the evolution and co-option of the public space, or argued by Habermas, the “bourgeois public sphere.” This shift often leaves the liberal, progressive, and human rights-orientated individuals out of the dialogue on the future of education, in part, readying a public willing to engage in new forms of decolonial thinking, resulting in more sophisticated right-wing intersections in policy and practice that directly affect educational equity and access.