Evans, Karen; (2020) Comparative vocational education and training research: what purposes does it serve? In: Pilz, Matthias and Li, Junmin, (eds.) Comparative Vocational Education Research Enduring Challenges and New Ways Forward. (pp. 3-19). Springer Nature: Wiesbaden, Germany.

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Abstract

Significant overlaps and creative tensions occur at the interfaces of comparative education and development studies, as distinctive bodies of theory inform and shape competing strands of research and discourses of scholarship. Within comparative education, there are long-running debates over the pursuit of generalisable scientific principles or contextualised understanding; between the purposes of policy borrowing, problem solving or helping educators in the ‘imagination’ of different ways of doing things. Some leading comparative scholars argue that comparative education is quite distinct from any notion of development towards more desirable states. Others contest the ‘development-free’ view, arguing strongly that development assumptions are deeply embedded in much comparative education work. Furthermore, the communicative domain of inter-cultural education, with a focus on mutual learning and exchange, has very significant overlaps with the ‘global dimension’ of comparative education, in focusing on education that links researchers, teachers and often students internationally in analysing common problems affecting individuals and communities across borders. How, within these overlapping domains, are we to locate the work of those who carry out cross-national studies in vocational education and training (VET), as research priorities increasingly focus on influences of globalisation, decentralising tendencies, cultural diversification and previously under-researched dimensions of gender, ethnicity and society? This paper, based on the opening lecture given at the third international conference on comparative education and training, explores the challenges of finding ‘common cause’ in defining the field, while seeking a dialogic approach in comparative VET in which traditions and perspectives can enrich and illuminate each other and, ultimately, what scholars do in practice.

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