School Policy Reform in Europe: Exploring transnational alignments, national particularities and contestations

TY - BOOK

T1 - School Policy Reform in Europe

T2 - Exploring transnational alignments, national particularities and contestations

A2 - Krejsler, John Benedicto

A2 - Moos, Lejf

PY - 2023/8

Y1 - 2023/8

N2 - The core of investigation in this volume is how national school policy reforms in a number of key European countries covering all key regions are framed in transnational collaborations that meet with national particularities and contestations. The volume aims at giving an overview of school policy developments in a sufficient number of countries and regions to represent the diversity of Europe within a comparative framework applied to all chapters. It takes point of departure in the fact that European countries in their school and education policies have been increasingly aligning with each other, mostly via transnational collaborations, the OECD and EU. Even the IEA has been instrumental to motivate alignments by means of influential surveys, knowledge production and methodological development (Hultqvist, Lindblad, & Popkewitz, 2018; Krejsler, 2020; Lawn & Grek, 2012; Meyer & Benavot, 2013; Moos, 2017; Rizvi & Lingard, 2010). This alignment in terms of common standards, social technologies, qualification frameworks and so forth have aimed at facilitating mobility of students, workers, business and so forth as well as fostering a European identity among citizens from Europe’s patchwork of small and medium-size countries, representing a patchwork of different languages, cultures and societal contexts (Nóvoa & Lawn, 2002; Popkewitz, 2012). This volume maps the processes of de-contextualization, when policymakers broker consensus in transnational agencies, up against the ensuing processes of re-contextualization when this de-contextualized consensus has to be re-contextualized in widely differing national contexts; here standards, frameworks and social technologies have to be adapted and digested to forms that make sense in relation to what is politically and educationally possible in each and every of these different contexts (Steiner-Khamsi, 2012). Unsurprisingly, however, these processes of policy transfer, exchange and mutual inspiration are equally rife with national contestation as transnational norms meet with national traditions. This volume thus maps the diversity of contestations that transnational policy also produces when it meets particular national contexts, ranging from progressive reform pedagogy and Bildung resistance to positivist and economistic approaches to education over increasing focus upon ‘national values’ to recent outright nationalist resentment to transnational and multilateral encroachment upon national sovereignty (Blossing, Imsen, & Moos, 2016; Hörner, Döbert, Reuter, & von Kopp, 2015; Judis, 2016; Krejsler & Moos, 2021; Uljens & Ylimaki, 2017). Equally problematic – and possibly even more opaque - is the national uptake of transnational school and educational policy is the ‘intermediary’ of issues like digitalization and commercialization by means of which policy passes as it is transformed into organization and practice (Ball, 2012; Williamson, 2017). In our approach we thus see the interplays of transnational and national school policy reforms as the intended and unintended strategies and effects of widely differing contexts for making policy for schools, i.e. reflecting what is politically and educationally possible within the national contexts, framed by its particularities: This includes attention to increased focus upon ‘national values’, immigration, populism, and so forth (Bergmann, 2018; Judis, 2016) as well as the framing effects on transnational and national school policies by particular approaches to adopting global challenges like digitalization and increasing commercialization (e.g. big data, algorithmization and platformization) (Appadurai, 2006; Snricek, 2017; Williamson, 2017).

AB - The core of investigation in this volume is how national school policy reforms in a number of key European countries covering all key regions are framed in transnational collaborations that meet with national particularities and contestations. The volume aims at giving an overview of school policy developments in a sufficient number of countries and regions to represent the diversity of Europe within a comparative framework applied to all chapters. It takes point of departure in the fact that European countries in their school and education policies have been increasingly aligning with each other, mostly via transnational collaborations, the OECD and EU. Even the IEA has been instrumental to motivate alignments by means of influential surveys, knowledge production and methodological development (Hultqvist, Lindblad, & Popkewitz, 2018; Krejsler, 2020; Lawn & Grek, 2012; Meyer & Benavot, 2013; Moos, 2017; Rizvi & Lingard, 2010). This alignment in terms of common standards, social technologies, qualification frameworks and so forth have aimed at facilitating mobility of students, workers, business and so forth as well as fostering a European identity among citizens from Europe’s patchwork of small and medium-size countries, representing a patchwork of different languages, cultures and societal contexts (Nóvoa & Lawn, 2002; Popkewitz, 2012). This volume maps the processes of de-contextualization, when policymakers broker consensus in transnational agencies, up against the ensuing processes of re-contextualization when this de-contextualized consensus has to be re-contextualized in widely differing national contexts; here standards, frameworks and social technologies have to be adapted and digested to forms that make sense in relation to what is politically and educationally possible in each and every of these different contexts (Steiner-Khamsi, 2012). Unsurprisingly, however, these processes of policy transfer, exchange and mutual inspiration are equally rife with national contestation as transnational norms meet with national traditions. This volume thus maps the diversity of contestations that transnational policy also produces when it meets particular national contexts, ranging from progressive reform pedagogy and Bildung resistance to positivist and economistic approaches to education over increasing focus upon ‘national values’ to recent outright nationalist resentment to transnational and multilateral encroachment upon national sovereignty (Blossing, Imsen, & Moos, 2016; Hörner, Döbert, Reuter, & von Kopp, 2015; Judis, 2016; Krejsler & Moos, 2021; Uljens & Ylimaki, 2017). Equally problematic – and possibly even more opaque - is the national uptake of transnational school and educational policy is the ‘intermediary’ of issues like digitalization and commercialization by means of which policy passes as it is transformed into organization and practice (Ball, 2012; Williamson, 2017). In our approach we thus see the interplays of transnational and national school policy reforms as the intended and unintended strategies and effects of widely differing contexts for making policy for schools, i.e. reflecting what is politically and educationally possible within the national contexts, framed by its particularities: This includes attention to increased focus upon ‘national values’, immigration, populism, and so forth (Bergmann, 2018; Judis, 2016) as well as the framing effects on transnational and national school policies by particular approaches to adopting global challenges like digitalization and increasing commercialization (e.g. big data, algorithmization and platformization) (Appadurai, 2006; Snricek, 2017; Williamson, 2017).

KW - European school policy

KW - transnational education policy

KW - school reform

KW - evidence

KW - Europe

KW - comparative education

U2 - 10.1007/978-3-031-35434-2

DO - 10.1007/978-3-031-35434-2

M3 - Anthology

SN - 978-3-031-35433-5

SN - 978-3-031-35436-6

T3 - Educational Governance Research

BT - School Policy Reform in Europe

PB - Springer

CY - Cham

ER -