The socio-political context of the development of Reading Recovery in New Zealand and England

This article uses the example of Reading Recovery (RR) to argue that those who engage in reading debates should focus not only on which reading programme appears to match desirable goals in children's literacy development but also strive for a more balanced appreciation of the complex socio-political context of debates within which reading failure and its various remedies remain contestable. In turn this will lead to a more critical and more academically sophisticated scrutiny of literacy and its diverse purposes. The development of Reading Recovery in New Zealand and England illustrates how it is not simply the efficacy of individual programmes, but a combination of that efficacy and the political context at the micro- and macro-levels that establishes, expands and eventually destabilizes new reading initiatives