Abstract
ABSTRACT With the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), inclusive education has become the main alternative to special schools for the schooling of children with disabilities. In order to promote the global implementation of inclusive education, a variety of stakeholders form networks to transmit and exchange information and knowledge concerning political strategies. However, little is known about the actors and actor groups involved in these networks. In the present paper, we draw on general network theory and policy network theory to examine the Twitter communication network that has formed around the topic of inclusive education. Using exploratory and inferential social network analysis, we show that disabled persons’ organizations and international organizations, such as the United Nations, hold a particularly central position in the network. This position enables them to potentially exert influence on the content and flow of information within the network. Aside from that, business actors are active participants in the network. Moreover, the Twitter network shows some structural patterns that can also be found in policy networks. Our findings help to map the global sphere of inclusive education promotion and can contribute to a broader understanding of global processes in inclusive education policy.
Highlights
Inclusive education has emerged as the main alternative to special education for the schooling of children with disabilities (Powell, Edelstein, and Blanck 2016)
The main objective of this paper was to map the Twitter communication network that has formed around inclusive education in order to identify central actors and actor groups and to describe structural patterns in the network
Drawing on approaches of policy networks and general network theory, we used social network analysis to explore the role of individual actors and actor groups as well as characteristics of the network, which we statistically tested using inferential network analysis
Summary
Inclusive education has emerged as the main alternative to special education for the schooling of children with disabilities (Powell, Edelstein, and Blanck 2016). The implementation of inclusive school settings as the main form of education for children with disabilities is a policy process that comprises a variety of actors, both at the national and international level (Biermann 2016). From a cross-national perspective, the implementation of inclusive education varies strongly across states. This stems from diverging definitions of the issue as well as differences in traditional schooling structures and in the general perception of disability (Mitchell 2005). With the adoption of the United Nations (UN) Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) the right to inclusive education has gained the status of a human rights issue. State and non-state actors continue to advocate for the rights of persons with disabilities and the right to inclusive education (Biermann 2016), thereby keeping the topic on the agenda of international conferences on disability rights
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