Vasten valtavirtaa - kontingenssi, polkuriippuvuus ja konvergenssi suomalaisen perusopetuksen laadunarviointimallin kehityskuluissa
Year: 2010
Type: article
Abstract: Against the mainstream – contingency, path dependence and convergence of quality evaluation models in the Finnish basic education system The article revitalises standard concepts of comparative studies: path dependence, convergence and contingency, applied to Finnish education policy and politics since the early 1990s. The focus is on Quality Assurance and Evaluation (QAE) of comprehensive schooling. The article elaborates and contextualises Finnish QAE policy by analysing the peculiar and ambiguous ways in which various forms QAE have or have not been received and mediated in Finland. Research data consists of documents concerning compulsory education provision at the national level: laws and legislative drafts, memoranda and reports. The documentary analyses are complemented by thematic interviews. It appears that a strong contradiction between convergent pursuit of international acceptance as an advanced liberal Western society on the one hand, and deep rooted path dependence on traditional social democratic and agrarian egalitarianism, on the other, have made Finnish QAE policy curiously bipolar. In national educational rhetorics, global education reform discourse has achieved a hegemonic position, while in implementation processes at the local level a silent consensus remains, based on egalitarianism and antipathy toward both the normative control of the past and the ranking lists of today.
Source: Hallinnon Tutkimus
Authors: Hanna Simola, Janne Varjo, Risto Rinne
Language: Finnish
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Quality education
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W147591491