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Danish – and Nordic – School Policy: Its Anglo-American Connections and Influences

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What Works in Nordic School Policies?

Part of the book series: Educational Governance Research ((EGTU,volume 15))

Abstract

Since the 1990s, Danish - and Nordic - schools and education policy has been increasingly influenced by Anglo-American understandings of how to improve school and education. This was due to an interplay of influences: (1) postwar US economic and cultural dominance; (2) American led postwar transnational collaboration in Europe that gradually institutionalized into the OECD, the EU, the Bologna Process, and the IEA; (3) the hegemony of Anglo-American norms migrated from the realms of economics and geopolitics to school and education collaborations. This chapter explores five particularly influential themes of Anglo-American influence: (1) Human capital and rational choice theory impacted Danish schools and education policy as ‘knowledge economy’ and ‘competition state’ discourse raised the stakes. (2) The school effectiveness and improvement movement developed the ideas of ‘knowledge that works’ and school reform, which gained dominance in transnational policy collaborations. (3) The ‘evidence’ movement transformed policy conceptions of what works. (4) New Zealand and Ontario school reform policy impacted Danish schools due to their ‘softer’ low-stakes accountability approaches. English school policy chose a high-stakes accountability approach in education, which was influential in mediating ‘new public management’ and market-like approaches in education to Denmark. (5) The policies of the United States were agenda-setting for schools and education policy within the Anglo-American networks.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    In Denmark a university college offers profession specific tertiary education and diploma courses (e.g. teachers, social workers and nurses).

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  1. Danish School of Education, Aarhus University, Copenhagen, Denmark

    John Benedicto Krejsler & Lejf Moos

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  1. Danish School of Education, Aarhus University, Copenhagen, Denmark

    John Benedicto Krejsler

  2. Danish School of Education, Aarhus University, Copenhagen, Denmark

    Lejf Moos

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Krejsler, J.B., Moos, L. (2021). Danish – and Nordic – School Policy: Its Anglo-American Connections and Influences. In: Krejsler, J.B., Moos, L. (eds) What Works in Nordic School Policies?. Educational Governance Research, vol 15. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-66629-3_7

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