Erwin H. Epstein

Currents Left and Right: Ideology in Comparative Education.

The thought that scholarship may not be wholly invulnerable to ideology profoundly disturbs the academic world. Science is supposed to discover truth-it seeks to scrape off the veneer of subjective judgment to achieve wisdom, insight, and understanding. Systematic methods are painstakingly devised to serve this goal. Entire tomes are devoted solely to advancing objectivity in procedure and to avoiding ideological deception. Such fear of ideology is well justified, for a science contaminated by partisan belief diminishes intellectual activity. We in comparative education should be particularly concerned about entanglements with ideology. Comparative fields are peculiarly vulnerable, being exposed to varying national orientations and incompatible world views. Moreover, education is societys most enduring mechanism for inculcating belief systems. Yet we have rarely openly acknowledged the existence of ideology in our activities, however much we wrestle over competing methodologies. Whether out of a sense of academic etiquette or due to simple obliviousness, scholars in the field have generally failed to identify explicitly the ideological roots of rival orientation. Unless we boldly confront the issue of ideology it will obscure insight and erode the value of our work.

Abusing Ancestors: Historical Functionalism and the Postmodern Deviation in Comparative Education

Comparative education, as an eclectic field, contains flexible boundaries whose contours are often difficult to discern. Are the boundaries of comparative education wide enough (or, perhaps better said, narrow enough) to make it a “science”? Should it be largely a policy-driven field, or should it focus mainly on theory? How “hard” or “soft” should the field be? What part should intuition play in research? To what extent should comparative education draw on other fields for insight and inspiration, and to what extent can and should comparative education stand apart from other fields? These are not idle questions. They hang on the very meaning of “comparison” and have been part of the field’s discourse since its inception, and with good reason: the relevance of comparative education is tied to the palpability of comparison. If the meaning of comparison is unclear, so will be the field’s relevance for theory development as well as policy formulation. Yet as important as these questions are, they have been eclipsed recently by an even more compelling issue, also having to do with the nature of comparison, brought on by a clash of theoretical perspectives. That issue is: can pieces of theoretical perspectives be borrowed and amalgamated with fragments of rival theoretical perspectives to form even stronger constructs? In his provocative 2004 Eggertsen Lecture before the Comparative and International Education Society, Val D. Rust argued that they can and should be. He made three particularly salient claims. First, he contended that we should pick and choose elements of different theoretical movements as appropriate to given situations to gain appropriate perspectives in our scholarship. He advanced this argument by quoting Ludwig Wittgenstein that “a

Setting the normative boundaries: crucial epistemological benchmarks in comparative education

Historians of comparative education have ordinarily viewed the development of that field as having progressed in stages, from impressionistic traveller tales to systematic investigations, with each stage eclipsing the previous one in rigour and acceptability. In this essay, I show that this common ‘Darwinian’ view is simplistic and distorts the real development of comparative education. Rather than in stages, I contend that the field has developed within three epistemological streams: positivist, relativist, and historical functionalist. These streams, each shaped over many decades, continue to be alive and well and delineate the field’s normative boundaries. Indeed, comparativists differ markedly in defining the field, because their definitions arise out of whichever particular epistemological stream they embrace. What we need is a definition that encompasses all normative streams, and the one that I propose is: comparative education is the application of the intellectual tools of history and the social sciences to understanding international issues of education.

Is Marc-Antoine Jullien de Paris the ‘father’ of comparative education?

Abstract More than any other historical figure, Marc-Antoine Jullien of Paris has been considered the ‘Father’ of Comparative Education, and his Esquisse d’un ouvrage sur l’éducation compare, appearing in 1816–17, has been viewed as that field’s originating source. Yet, the view that Jullien is the first in his field, and that his Esquisse is the field’s foundational work, is open to doubt. This article shows that the issues of Jullien’s pre-eminence can be explored by means of a variety of approaches. It examines challenges to Jullien’s pre-eminence in the pantheon of founding comparativists by addressing several sets of questions. First, is Jullien the first comparativist of education? Did Juillien have predecessors or, for that matter, successors with equal or greater claim to that status? Second, did Jullien set the binding path for Comparative Education, or did he set just one among several normative paths? Finally, is the issue of Jullien’s pre-eminence tied to a common definition of Comparative Education? Or, do varying definitions of the field produce contrasting assessments of Jullien’s pre-eminence?

Social Paradoxes of American Education.

Abstract This articles identifies four issues whose resolution will shape the future of American elementary and secondary education. These are as follows. (1) Will the principle of decentralised control prevail over the seemingly inexorable tendency to consolidate power at the centre? (2) Will continuing emphasis on mass education obscure increasing demands to improve quality and raise achievement levels? (3) Will schools advance equality of educational opportunity, or reproduce inequalities inherent in the society? (4) Will schools integrate culturally heterogeneous populations at the expense of legitimate expressions of ethnic cultures? This article shows how these issues mirror ambiguities underlying American democratic principles, and offers some comparisons to conditions of education in Europe.

Professionalizing the Field

The debate concerning the professional status of comparative and international education has a relatively short yet tumultuous history, beginning roughly in the mid-twentieth century. Two professional organizations, in particular, have been at the center of this debate, and are now among the oldest comparative and international education (CIE) associations. The Comparative and International Education Society (CIES) was established in 1956, and NAFSA (The Association of International Educators) was established in 1948.1 Yet, comparative researchers and international educators are still struggling to distinguish themselves as belonging to a unique profession. In fact, the debate as to the status of comparative and international education as a profession began about the time these associations were founded (Heath 1958), and has ebbed and flowed ever since.

Early Leaders: Isaac L. Kandel, William W. Brickman, and C. Arnold Anderson

Does this quotation from the New York Times sound familiar? It should. Reports that the U.S. is falling behind many countries in technological fields have become commonplace. In response to such claims, U.S. President Barack Obama, on June 13, 2011, announced a program to train 10,000 new American engineers every year and generally promote education in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, the socalled “STEM” disciplines. The emphasis here is clear that although armaments and soldiers are in the front line of national defense, a modem nation ultimately depends for its security on the intellectual preparation of its citizens.

Shaping the Intellectual Landscape

The shape of the intellectual landscape of any given scholarly field can be attributed to a variety of factors, not least of which are the thoughts and acts of its early leaders. In this chapter, I focus on the role played by some early editors of the Comparative Education Review (CER).

The Social Organization of CIES Special Interest Groups

At the 2005 Comparative and International Education Society (CIES) Conference, held at Stanford University, the OES Board of Directors approved the creation of Special Interests Groups (SIGs). SIGs are small communities within a larger professional organization that provide a forum for the involvement of individuals with shared interests in advancing a field of study. SIGs are a feature in some other professional associations such as the American Educational Research Association (AERA) and the American Sociological Association (ASA). The CIES Bylaws (Article V) outline the purpose of SIGs: “[to] promote new research and mentor educational researchers.” The Bylaws stipulate that “any group of 15 or more active OES members may petition to establish a SIG” and that membership dues must be similar across all SIGs and across all members (US

Comparative education research: approaches and methods

10). As observed by Williams (2008), the Bylaws leave the definition and delineation of the focus of a proposed SIG to the petitioners.