Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Education policy as normative discourse and negotiated meanings: Engaging the Holocaust in Estonia

  • OPEN FILE
  • Published:
PROSPECTS Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This article uses a socio-cultural approach to analyze the formation and implementation of Estonia’s Holocaust Day Policy, a day of both commemoration for victims of the Holocaust and other crimes against humanity, and education about the Holocaust. It investigates both the multi-level development of the policy in light of external pressure (from foreign advocates and transnational groups including NATO and the Council of Europe) and the ways in which policy as normative discourse was constructed and its meanings negotiated between international sources, the national government, and educators. It draws attention to the multifaceted nature of discourse in a post-authoritarian context where power disparities further complicate an already complex trans-national policy environment.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Aarelaid-Tart, A. (2003). Double mental standards in the Baltic countries—three generations. In A. M. Kõll (Ed.), The Baltic countries under occupation: Soviet and Nazi rule 1939–1991 (pp. 215–228). Stockholm: University of Stockholm Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baltic States Report (2003, February 10). RFE/RL Reports 4, no. 5.

  • Burawoy, M., & Verdery, K. (Eds.). (1999). Uncertain transitions: Ethnographies of change in the post-socialist world. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.

    Google Scholar 

  • City Paper’s Baltics Worldwide (2002, November 18). News highlights from Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia.

  • Click, C. (2010, May. 21). A Q&A with Nazi hunter Efraim Zuroff. The State. http://www.thestate.com/2010/05/21/v-print/1296179/a-qa-with-nazi-hunter-efraim-zuroff.html.

  • DeThomas, J. M. (2002, May 28). Past, present and future. Online Intervjuud. www.epl.ee.

  • Dye, T. R. (1992). Understanding public policy (7th ed.). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

    Google Scholar 

  • Embassy of the United States in Estonia (2002, April 24). Remarks by Heather Conley, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs at Stockholm Security Conference, The United States and Northern Europe, A Continuing Commitment.

  • Estonian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2006, January 26). The Holocaust Day was commemorated in Estonia. http://www.vm.ee/?q=en/node/3692.

  • Fowler, F. C. (2009). Policy studies for educational leaders (3rd ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gross, Z. (2010). Holocaust education in Jewish schools in Israel: Goals, dilemmas, challenges. Prospects, 40 (1).

  • Guba, E. (1984, October). The effects of definitions of policy on the nature and outcomes of policy analysis. Educational Leadership, 63–70.

  • Kalamees, K. (2002, August 7). Lapsed peavad natside hukatud juute mälestama. [Children must remember Jews killed by the Nazis]. Eesti Päevaleht. http://epl.ekspress.ee/artikkel/211529.

  • Katz, D. (2009a). The Baltic project to delete the Holocaust from European history: Observations from Lithuania. Twelfth lecture of the Eighth Herbert Berman Memorial Series, Institute for Global Jewish Affairs, Jerusalem, June 23, 2009.

  • Katz, D. (2009b). On three definitions: Genocide, Holocaust denial, Holocaust obfuscation. In L. Donskis (Ed.), A litmus test case of modernity: Examining modern sensibilities and the public domain in the Baltic States at the turn of the century (pp. 259–277). Bern: Peter Lang.

    Google Scholar 

  • Katz, D. (2010, May 3). The crime of surviving. Tablet Magazine. http://www.tabletmag.com/news-and-politics/32432/the-crime-of-surviving/print/.

  • Leesi, L. (2002, August 9). Millal ja kuidas võiks eesti koolides tähistada holokausti mälestuspäeva? [When and how should Holocaust Memorial Day be commemorated in Estonian schools?]. Õppetajate leht. Retrieved from www.opleht.ee/Arhiiv/2002/09.08.02/arvamus/1.shtml.

  • Levinson, B. A. U., & Sutton, M. (2001). Introduction: Policy as/in practice—a sociocultural approach to the study of educational policy. In M. Sutton & B. A. U. Levinson (Eds.), Policy as practice: Toward a comparative sociocultural analysis of educational policy (pp. 1–22). Westport, CT: Ablex.

    Google Scholar 

  • Levinson, B. A. U., Sutton, M., & Winstead, T. (2009). Education policy as a practice of power: Theoretical tools, ethnographic methods, democratic options. Educational Policy, 23(6), 767–795.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lukas, T. (2000, October 18). Eesti koolides ei ole holokaustipäeval mõtet. [In Estonian schools, there is no thought given to Holocaust Day]. Eesti Päevaleht Retrieved from http://www.epl.ee/artikkel/125725.

  • Marcus, G. E. (1995). Ethnography in/of the world system: The emergence of multi-sited ethnography. Annual Review of Anthropology, 24, 95–117.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • mauri [sic] (2003, April 10). Holokaustipäev kui NATO pileti konts. [Holocaust Day as the entry ticket for NATO]. http://www.minut.ee/article.pl?sid=03/04/10/2249239&mode=nested.

  • Nielson, I. (2003, January 25). Holokaustipäev jätab koolid ükskõikseks [Schools remain indifferent to Holocaust Day]. Pärnu Postimees. http://vana.www.parnupostimees.ee/index.html?op=lugu&rubriik=77&id=15996&number=457.

  • Online Intervjuud [Online Interviews] (2002, August 8). Eesti Päevaleht. http://www.epl.ee/artikkel/211472.

  • Oolo, A. (2002, August 24). Koolijuhid peavad holokaustipäeva tähistamist ületähtsustamiseks [School directors believe Holocaust Commemoration Day overemphasizes its significance]. Ärileht. www.arileht.ee/artikkel/212818.

  • Paet, U. (2010, May 14). Speech of Foreign Minister Urmas Paet at the opening of the exhibit Convoy nr. 73—Convoy with a singular fate. http://www.holocausttaskforce.org/images/itf_data/documents/08_news/speech_of_urmas_paet_at_exhibition_opening.pdf.

  • Shafir, M. (2002). Between denial and “comparative trivialization”: Holocaust negationism in post-Communist East Central Europe. Analysis of Current Trends in Antisemitism, 19.

  • Snyder, T. (2009). The historical reality of Eastern Europe. East European Politics and Societies, 23(7), 7–12.

    Google Scholar 

  • Spillane, J., Reiser, B., & Reimer, T. (2002). Policy implementation and cognition: Reframing and refocusing policy implementation research. Review of Educational Research, 72, 387–431.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stevick, E. D. (2007). The politics of the Holocaust in Estonia: Historical memory and social divisions in Estonian education. In E. D. Stevick & B. A. U. Levinson (Eds.), Reimagining civic education: How diverse societies form democratic citizens (pp. 217–244). Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stevick, E. D. (2009). Overlapping democracies, Europe’s democratic deficit, and national education policy: Estonia’s school leaders as heirs to a Soviet legacy or as agents of democracy? European Education, 41(3), 42–59.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stevick, E. D. (in press). Finessing foreign pressure in education policy: Soviet legacy, European prescriptions, and democratic accountability in Estonia. In J. N. Hawkins & W. J. Jacob (Eds.), Policy debates in comparative, international and development education. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

  • Stevick, E. D., & Gross, Z. (2010). Introduction to the Open File—epistemology and Holocaust education: History, memory and the politics of knowledge (in this issue).

  • Thompson, D. (1999). Democratic theory and global society. Journal of Political Philosophy, 7(2), 114–125.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tooming, R. (2003, January 24). Koolides tähistatakse holokausti päeva [Holocaust day is commemorated in schools]. Eesti Päevaleht. http://arhiiv.koolielu.ee/pages.php/020402,5988.

  • Torney-Purta, J. (2000). Comparative perspectives on political socialization and civic education. Comparative Education Review, 44(1), 88–95.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wedel, J., & Feldman, G. (2005). Why an anthropology of public policy? Anthropology Today, 21(1), 1–2.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Weiss-Wendt, A. (2008). Why the Holocaust does not matter to Estonians. Journal of Baltic Studies, 39(4), 475–497.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zakaria, F. (1997, November). The rise of illiberal democracy. Foreign Affairs. http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/53577/fareed-zakaria/the-rise-of-illiberal-democracy.

  • Zuroff, E. (2002, August 7th). Holokausti päev Eestis oleks suur samm edasi [Holocaust Day would be a big step forward]. Eesti Päevaleht. http://www.epl.ee/artikkel/211542.

  • Zuroff, E. (2005, spring). Eastern Europe: Anti-Semitism in the wake of Holocaust-related issues. Jewish Political Studies Review, 17(1–2). www.jcpa.org/phas/phas-zuroff-s05.htm.

  • Zuroff, E. (2009). Operation last chance: One man’s quest to bring Nazi criminals to justice. New York: Palgrave-Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zuroff, E. (2010, May 1). No tolerance for false history. Jerusalem Post. http://www.jpost.com/LandedPages/PrintArticle.aspx?id=174425.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Education, University of South Carolina, 318 Wardlaw Hall, Columbia, SC, 29208, USA

    E. Doyle Stevick

Authors
  1. E. Doyle Stevick
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to E. Doyle Stevick.

About this article

Cite this article

Stevick, E.D. Education policy as normative discourse and negotiated meanings: Engaging the Holocaust in Estonia. Prospects 40, 239–256 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11125-010-9158-2

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11125-010-9158-2

Keywords

Search

Navigation