The comparative analysis of modern foreign concepts and systems of professional training of specialists in Western European countries has been carried out. Leading ideas, principles and regularities of the development of continuous professional education have been revealed. It has been stated that most developed European countries gradually reduce…

This article describes and discusses the development of lifelong learning policy in two EU member states, Denmark and Portugal. The purpose is to show how different societal and historical contexts shape the development and implementation of lifelong learning policies, even though these policies have significant common elements. As a basis for the…

Understanding today's Vocational Education and Training (VET) systems requires a comprehension of the rise and development, i.e. of the foundations of topical VET. This book provides a comparative view of its development in Europe. The contributions of renowned authors give insight into conceptual questions, cases, and challenges in this field.

Research into Vocational Education and Training (VET) has undergone major developments in the last 60 years. This is particularly true of the last 30 years. The rising political, social and economic priority of VET has been principally responsible for this development. However, it is also true to say that some of the disciplines of education have…

Taking as its starting point that the adjective international is an inadequate, but unavoidable, label to describe the content of a contemporary international education, this article sets out to explore some of the issues facing international education in a post-international world. It draws mainly on writings in French as a deliberate…

More than four decades ago, Philip J. Foster (1927-2008) published an essay on the "The vocational school fallacy in development planning," drawing on research on schools in Ghana. That essay has been reprinted in numerous texts and remains frequently quoted in recent research literature. What were his main general insights about vocational…

In this article, the authors develop an argument about the global forces that have led to the explosive growth of national educational assessment and international testing. In particular, the authors argue that the international acceptance of testing comes from key ideological forces in the world polity that are associated with the accelerating…

This article explores the impact of student self-financing systems on inequalities of access to higher education (HE) through comparative analysis of two national systems, those of England and Australia. The analysis of the historical development of HE in each nation identifies a set of comparative global themes: the expansion of HE in response to…

Although there is a considerable body of research regarding the relationships between the sociopolitical and economic transition and its implications for the education system in South Korea, there is little known about how sociopolitical and economic factors affect labor education practice in South Korea. The premise of the study is that the…

This article revisits a topic central to the past and the present of comparative education: the theme of "transfer". It outlines four ideas. First, that comparative education as a field of study, having begun in the study of "mobilities", became diverted by other anxieties. Second, the article notes that the theme of…

This report was produced for the 2012 Conference of Commonwealth Education Ministers meeting in Mauritius. Its main purpose is to track the historical progress and likelihood of attainment of Education For All and education-specific Millennium Development Goals while also critically reviewing the methods used to track this progress. The analyses…

Historians of comparative education have ordinarily viewed the development of that field as having progressed in stages, from impressionistic traveller tales to systematic investigations, with each stage eclipsing the previous one in rigour and acceptability. In this essay, I show that this common "Darwinian" view is simplistic and distorts the…

This paper provides an account of the main approaches, debates and evidence in the literature on the role of workforce skills in the innovation process in developed economies. It draws on multiple sources including the innovation studies discipline, neoclassical Human Capital theory, institutionalist labour market studies and the work organisation…

This article takes up the issue of the internationalisation of Vocational Education and Training (VET) reforms, expressed in the way policy instruments such as National Qualifications Frameworks (NQF) are introduced in the European Training Foundation's (ETF) partner countries. There is an international debate and different perspectives regarding…

This article reflects on gender mainstreaming policies post Beijing and their impact on development cooperation and relations between the Global North and Global South. The analysis is based on an examination of gender equality politics in Sweden, their connection with an interpretation of gender mainstreaming and the application of this approach…