ILPC 2027

The public reform has been restructuring the employment relations since the beginning of the 2000’s in Turkey. Education sector which achieves one of the largest employment figures in the public sector, gained importance from the beginning. This study assesses the effects of the public reform and regarding practices on the employment relations at the primary and secondary levels in public education in Turkey.

The “Public Administration Reform”, which has stated its impetus as being market-oriented and aiming the state out of the public services and production, should be considered as a continuation of that liberalisation process in the country. In the 2000’s the EU and other developed countries also have been in a reform process regarding their own public sectors. This “New Public Management” (NPM) methodology defines a new paradigm led by the principle of “meeting citizen/customer demands with better choices and services” (Thompson and Miller, 2003). This paradigm shift covers some ideological aspects as well as structural and administrative ones.(Davies and Thomas, 2005). In accordance with this: a high performance human resources management; an accordingly adapted financial system and decentralised, horizontal and small scaled structures are expected (Özoğlu, 2005).

One of the main components of the public reform is the “public employment relations”, covering the public employment and personnel regimes. This subject area can be handled in two main topics such as the recruitment and the labour processes. Recruitment covers the employment contracts and statuses. The public labour processes on the other hand, define the working conditions, performance appraisals, pay and other related conditions. “The New Public Personnel Regime” applies to the first area whereas “Performance Management Techniques” covers the later.

This paper will be focusing on the teaching labour processes within this market oriented and commercialised conjuncture (Ozga and Lawn, 1981, 1988; Smyth 1991;  Sinclair et al. 1996; Reid 2003; Stevenson et al. 2007). The performance management techniques regarding the teaching labour processes had started with the implementation of Total Quality Management (TQM) practices at schools in the year 1999 in Turkey. Following this TQM model, a new project was launched and proceeded by studies for determining the competencies and the relevant performance indicators.which are to be used for performance appraisals of the teachers. Currently, the government and the Ministry of National Education are in a comprehensive and continuous effort to implement this main perspective and method throughout all the country in all levels of education. The online “Performance Appraisal System” has been activated for the first time at the 2016-2017 school year. These performance management practices directly affects the employment relations in education. This study aims to reveal the ways in which this “new” regime transfers into the teaching labour processes at schools in Turkey.