Comparative education
An Emerald mission in support of the UN Sustainable Development Goals
Understanding educational structures and systems around the world is imperative to improving and enhancing the delivery of quality education for all. But how can comparative education help to identify the best instructional models, academic standards, and policies of educational institutions?
This mission aims to address this question and more by highlighting and discussing theoretical and applied contributions to approaches and will showcase research related to comparative education to further the discussion and bring to life the successes and challenges of education programmes across the world at all levels including schools, colleges, and universities.
We’re inviting authors to publish with us in the field of education, so if you are working on an article or would like to contribute a blog or commentary then we’d love to hear from you.
This mission is aligned with our Quality education for all goal
On this page
- Featured journals
- Webinar: Comparative education
- BCES international conference
- Calls for papers
- Infographic: Comparing educational research in Singapore and Sweden
- Featured blogs & interview
- Related books
- Book series
- Book chapters
- Journal articles
- Special issue
- Get in touch
- Mission-led research – our goals
Webinar: comparative education
Join Professor Audrey Falk and expert panelists as they discuss comparative education.
This webinar, in partnership with Emerald Publishing and HETL, aims to address how comparative education can help to identify the best instructional models, academic standards, and policies of educational institutions by highlighting and discussing theoretical and applied contributions to approaches. It will showcase research related to comparative education to further the discussion and bring to life the successes and challenges of education programs at all levels around the world including schools, colleges, and universities.
Bulgarian Comparative Education Society
XXI Annual International Conference
Conference theme:
Recovering education: using the experiences and learning acquired to build new and better education systems
Sofia, Bulgaria, 27-30 June 2023
Comparing educational research in Singapore and Sweden
Article: Typifying educational research in Singapore and Sweden: a comparative bibliometric approach based on topics 2000–2020
Authors: Erik Nylander & Jason Tan
A study comparing educational research that has been produced by scholars in Singapore and Sweden.
> View the infographic | > Read the full article
What's in the infographic
Comparing educational research in Singapore and Sweden
Di fferent country-specific circumstances can influence the production, governance, and policies of educational research, including:
- Institutional histories and the role of state
- Degree of scholarly autonomy
- Research priorities and semantic composition
How and why does the educational research produced by scholars in Singapore and Sweden di ffer?
Comparative analysis of peer-reviewed literature on educational research from Singapore and Sweden
Topic modelling and analysis of bibliometric data
- 9,017 published articles (2000–2020)
- Identification and mapping of major topics of educational research
- Identification of national knowledge traditions and discourses
Two ideal-types of educational research
- 8 main topics concentrated around a few themes
- Higher emphasis on quantitative and outcome-based methods of inquiry
- Less critical research approaches
- Largely state-defined research priorities
- 25 main and diverse topics with no specific "centre of gravity"
- Higher emphasis on pluralistic and qualitative methods of inquiry
- Established critical research approaches
- Research priorities are mainly formed indepen
Governance and institutional di erences in educational research
- Centralised, state-controlled education system
- Research is mainly funded by the Ministry of Education
- Focus is largely limited to pedagogical issues, summative assessments, and outcomes
- Highly decentralised system
- Research is funded by autonomous institutions
- Critical inquiries on power relations and educational policy are common
Educational research in both countries is a reflection of the country-specific relationships between institutional histories, state influence, funding, research priorities, and research paradigms.
Typifying educational research in Singapore and Sweden: a comparative bibliometric approach based on topics 2000–2020
International Journal of Comparative Education and Development
Nylander and Tan (2022) | DOI: 10.1108/IJCED-12-2021-0128
Book Series
International Perspectives on Education and Society
Series Editor
Alexander W. Wiseman is Professor of Educational Leadership & Policy in the College of Education at Texas Tech University, USA. Dr. Wiseman has been an expert and leader in comparative and international education for a quarter of a century, and continues an active research agenda of comparative and international educational research on educational policy and practice using large-scale assessments, document analyses, and individual level data to contextualize, examine, understand, and inform refugee education, gender (in)equity, educator preparation, and educational leadership worldwide.
Annual Review of Comparative and International Education 2022 volume will be releasing in July 2023.
International Journal of Comparative Education and Development
Volume 23 Issue 2 & 3
Internationalization of higher education in the era of SDGs: Asia-Pacific Perspective
Talk to us about your work
We really welcome insights not only from researchers but practitioners too about their work.
If you would like to contribute to the discussion, or you are working on research in areas related to comparative education, please let us know by filling in this form.
