Conjunctions of power and comparative education

Abstract

This paper develops the basis of a comparative sociological account of the present state and potential of Comparative Education (CE) as a field of study by examining the mechanisms and contexts generated by three ‘conjunctions’ of power and CE. The first of these concerns issues of power over the field, how it has been, and is being, framed by the operation of ‘power’ of various kinds. Power over what counts as CE emerges through three forms of strategic selectivity, based on: (1) its missions, locations and wider contexts; (2) its political, discursive, theoretical, methodological and valorisational opportunity structures; and (3) its institutional locations within the structures of university governance and national and international funding bodies, and the conditions of knowledge production that they frame. Next, it addresses issues of power in CE, how it is and has been conceived, by whom, and with what analytic and political consequences. Finally, the paper directs attention to the potential power of CE. It focuses on two contrasting forms taken by the outputs of CE, the production of expertise and of explanation, which together suggest something of the nature of the dilemmas of the relationships between power and CE. Expertise concerns the power of the field as a source of comment and advice on the development of educational policy, based on qualitative and quantitative comparisons of education systems and their performances. The second, by contrast, considers the potential of a comparative approach to the explanation of social phenomena.