This article focuses on the interplay between institutional arrangements, family strategies, and market devices in the transition to higher education (HE) in France with a view to documenting both persistent features of the French 'conservative' educational regime and recent changes, in particular those related to neo-liberal influences. Using a…

Drawing from a range of secondary data sources, this paper succinctly overviews patterns of access to good-quality education in Turkey over the last 15 years. It also maps the policy context within which issues of access, quality and equity are examined. As a result of effective supply and demand side strategies, enrolment ratios beyond the…

Using data collected by the Birth-to-Twenty child cohort study in urban South Africa, this paper describes the patterns of schooling of a population of children born in the Greater Johannesburg area in April to June 1990. This paper examines the patterns of initial enrolment in Grade 1, transitions through grades, and trends in primary school…

Malawi was the first sub-Saharan African country to take a bold decision and declare free primary education after the Jomtien conference in 1990. Fourteen years after the policy was first implemented no serious attempt has been made to find out what has happened to the influx of pupils joining the system. Using secondary sources of data, this…

Review of "Politics and Policy-Making in Israel's Education System" (Haim Gaziel); "Educational Advancement and Distributive Justice between Equality and Equity" (Reuven Kahane, editor); and "Exchanging Writing, Exchanging Cultures: Lessons in School Reform from the United States and Great Britain" (Sarah Warshauer…

Outlines several ways of looking comparatively at democratic educational systems. Examines narratives of democratic education in American educational history; nation-building as a primary policy objective; and conceptual weaknesses of the model of elite, mass, and universal education. Sees current trends toward educational efficiency and quality…

Describes the "Nordic model" of small-scale, child-centered, equal education found in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and Iceland. Discusses challenges to this model from growing unemployment, increasing institutionalization of children's lives, and economic integration with the rest of Europe. Outlines Nordic hopes for future European…