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International comparisons play a decisive role in education policy. Undoubtedly, major international surveys have altered the expectations of national governments’ policymakers over the last decades and urged implementation of international standards and best practices (Nordin & Sundberg, 2014; Waldow & Steiner-Khamsi, 2019; Ydesen, 2019). The paper synthesises findings and interpretations from a Nordic research project on evidence-based policymaking (Sivesind & Karseth, 2022). Moreover, itidentifies distinct patterns of references to international knowledge sources in national policydocuments from three of the national cases during the 2000s. Our analysis examines how international and national experts interact in reform processes and draw on the authority of international references to develop and legitimate their own reform solutions for basiceducation (grades 1–10). In the joint research project, Policy Knowledge and Lesson Drawing in Nordic School Reform in an Era of International Comparisons (POLNET), the research teams selected a comparable set of policy documents and their associated sources published by the governments of the five Nordic countries. The papers prepared school reforms for the level K9/10 and addressed broad themes, such as renewing national curricula, redesigning assessment systems and amending legislative procedures. The teams systematised the metadata and created a shared bibliometric database of the references. We also conducted interviews with national and international experts in all five countries. In the study based on data material from three of the countries (Finland, Iceland and Denmark), Ydesen et al. (2022) found that all policy documents in the three countries adhere to the demands and tenets of evidence-based policy. The OECD policy instruments tended to be more authoritative than the other references, and the authors solidified the conclusion that bibliometric references signify more than merely conveying informatio

This article introduces the Special Issue ‘Re-reading the OECD and education: the emergence of a global governing complex’. Its distinctive contribution is related to its dual epistemological aims: to explore how different conceptual lenses and methodological approaches add to our understanding of the OECD as an intergovernmental organisation; and second, to understand the ways in which the strategic activities and priorities of the OECD have been constructed, historically and contemporarily, and the implications in terms of governance and education on a global scale. Broadly, this dual dynamic–of ‘seeing the OECD’ and ‘seeing like the OECD’–has generated the papers included in this Special Issue. Our Introduction outlines the specific foci and contributions of these papers with reference to four thematic lines of analysis in the research literature: (i) the changing capacities and positions of the OECD in global governance; (ii) the main ideas and styles of reasoning underpinning OECD governance; (iii) the formal and informal processes and workings of OECD’s policy formation; and (iv) the impact and wider implications of the OECD in education policy and practice.

The Right Stuff. Selection practices in The Sirius Dog Sled Patrol, an elite military unit in the Arctic 1950–2015This article investigates the development of the selection practice for the Danish Army’s Sirius unit. The dog sled patrol protects the sovereignty of the realm and maintains surveillance in Northeast Greenland by patrolling the uninhabited national park. The investigation is primarily based on interviews with former, retired and current managers of the unit, as well as psychologists involved in the selection practice. Four empirically and contextually substantiated chronological intersections of the selection-period of practice are compared: The first intersection covers the establishment of the patrol in the beginning of the 1950s. The second intersection covers the span of years from the 1960s to 1990, during which a basic selection practice was developed and institutionalized. The third intersection covers a ten-year span from 1990 to the millennium. Several noteworthy changes in the selection took place in this period. The forth intersection describes the current selection practice and puts the selection process in perspective. The investigation documents a significant evolution in selection practices over time. What began as an intuitive selection of the first patrol has become a comprehensive and systematic approach, but the basic concern remains the same. Duty in the Arctic is no picnic. A successful recruit must have ‘the right stuff’. From a testing perspective in sociological historical optics, it appears that societal and cultural trends have influenced the selection indicators and goals, and more elements have gradually been added to the testing procedure. A discretionary assessment made on the basis of Sirius participants’ experiences appears always to have been part of the selection. Psychological testing, a significant breakthrough, was added to the selection process in the late 1960s and it has played a prominent role ever since. During

This article takes as its starting point the idea that contemporary education is characterised by the presence of a global testing culture. The global testing culture reflects the fact that students’ learning outcomes and learning standards are at the centre of policymakers’ attention all over the world. Thus, the global testing culture plays a significant role in both educational policies and the conditions under which education is practiced in different national contexts. The aim of the article is to offer a brief, select outline of the precursors, antecedents, and preconditions that have promoted and facilitated the rise of our modern day global testing culture. The article is structured according to two chronological stages. The first stage encompasses a confluence of comparative education, the rise of applied psychology, and the transnational organisational structures that began forming in the pre-WWII setting. The second stage features the emergence of the foundations and organisations of the global testing culture in the wake of WWII, a period pre-occupied with educational measurement and comparisons. The article argues that these developments, which built on a framework established mainly during the interwar years, subsequently conflated into a trajectory that was fostered and promoted by policies during the Cold War, and became dominant from the 1990s onwards., El presente artículo parte de la idea de que la educación contemporánea está caracterizada por la presencia de una cultura evaluativa global. Dicha cultura refleja el hecho de que los resultados y los estándares del aprendizaje de los estudiantes son el foco de atención de quienes elaboran las políticas públicas en todo el mundo. Así, la cultura evaluativa global tiene un papel preponderante tanto en las políticas de educación como en las condiciones en las que se desarrollan las prácticas educativas en los diferentes contextos nacionales. El objetivo de este artículo es proporcionar una descripción breve y de calidad de los precursores, antecedentes y condiciones que alentaron y facilitaron el surgimiento de la cultura evaluativa global que observamos en nuestros días. El artículo se estructura a partir de dos etapas cronológicas. La primera abarca la confluencia de la educación comparada con la aparición de la psicología aplicada y las estructuras organizacionales transnacionales que comenzaron a formarse en el contexto previo a la Segunda Guerra Mundial. La segunda etapa comprende el surgimiento de fundaciones y organizaciones dedicadas a la cultura evaluativa global luego de la Segunda Guerra Mundial, período en el que se evidenció una especial preocupación por las comparaciones y mediciones en el ámbito de la educación. Se postula en este artículo que estos desarrollos, que se produjeron a partir de un marco establecido principalmente durante los años de entreguerras, se fusionaron con posterioridad en una trayectoria promovida por las políticas durante la Guerra Fría, y se convirtieron luego en una tendencia predominante a partir de la década de 1990.

The Right Stuff. Selection practices in The Sirius Dog Sled Patrol, an elite military unit in the Arctic 1950–2015This article investigates the development of the selection practice for the Danish Army’s Sirius unit. The dog sled patrol protects the sovereignty of the realm and maintains surveillance in Northeast Greenland by patrolling the uninhabited national park. The investigation is primarily based on interviews with former, retired and current managers of the unit, as well as psychologists involved in the selection practice. Four empirically and contextually substantiated chronological intersections of the selection-period of practice are compared: The first intersection covers the establishment of the patrol in the beginning of the 1950s. The second intersection covers the span of years from the 1960s to 1990, during which a basic selection practice was developed and institutionalized. The third intersection covers a ten-year span from 1990 to the millennium. Several noteworthy changes in the selection took place in this period. The forth intersection describes the current selection practice and puts the selection process in perspective. The investigation documents a significant evolution in selection practices over time. What began as an intuitive selection of the first patrol has become a comprehensive and systematic approach, but the basic concern remains the same. Duty in the Arctic is no picnic. A successful recruit must have ‘the right stuff’. From a testing perspective in sociological historical optics, it appears that societal and cultural trends have influenced the selection indicators and goals, and more elements have gradually been added to the testing procedure. A discretionary assessment made on the basis of Sirius participants’ experiences appears always to have been part of the selection. Psychological testing, a significant breakthrough, was added to the selection process in the late 1960s and it has played a prominent role ever since. During

The Right Stuff. Selection practices in The Sirius Dog Sled Patrol, an elite military unit in the Arctic 1950–2015This article investigates the development of the selection practice for the Danish Army’s Sirius unit. The dog sled patrol protects the sovereignty of the realm and maintains surveillance in Northeast Greenland by patrolling the uninhabited national park. The investigation is primarily based on interviews with former, retired and current managers of the unit, as well as psychologists involved in the selection practice. Four empirically and contextually substantiated chronological intersections of the selection-period of practice are compared: The first intersection covers the establishment of the patrol in the beginning of the 1950s. The second intersection covers the span of years from the 1960s to 1990, during which a basic selection practice was developed and institutionalized. The third intersection covers a ten-year span from 1990 to the millennium. Several noteworthy changes in the selection took place in this period. The forth intersection describes the current selection practice and puts the selection process in perspective. The investigation documents a significant evolution in selection practices over time. What began as an intuitive selection of the first patrol has become a comprehensive and systematic approach, but the basic concern remains the same. Duty in the Arctic is no picnic. A successful recruit must have ‘the right stuff’. From a testing perspective in sociological historical optics, it appears that societal and cultural trends have influenced the selection indicators and goals, and more elements have gradually been added to the testing procedure. A discretionary assessment made on the basis of Sirius participants’ experiences appears always to have been part of the selection. Psychological testing, a significant breakthrough, was added to the selection process in the late 1960s and it has played a prominent role ever since. During

The Right Stuff. Selection practices in The Sirius Dog Sled Patrol, an elite military unit in the Arctic 1950–2015This article investigates the development of the selection practice for the Danish Army’s Sirius unit. The dog sled patrol protects the sovereignty of the realm and maintains surveillance in Northeast Greenland by patrolling the uninhabited national park. The investigation is primarily based on interviews with former, retired and current managers of the unit, as well as psychologists involved in the selection practice. Four empirically and contextually substantiated chronological intersections of the selection-period of practice are compared: The first intersection covers the establishment of the patrol in the beginning of the 1950s. The second intersection covers the span of years from the 1960s to 1990, during which a basic selection practice was developed and institutionalized. The third intersection covers a ten-year span from 1990 to the millennium. Several noteworthy changes in the selection took place in this period. The forth intersection describes the current selection practice and puts the selection process in perspective. The investigation documents a significant evolution in selection practices over time. What began as an intuitive selection of the first patrol has become a comprehensive and systematic approach, but the basic concern remains the same. Duty in the Arctic is no picnic. A successful recruit must have ‘the right stuff’. From a testing perspective in sociological historical optics, it appears that societal and cultural trends have influenced the selection indicators and goals, and more elements have gradually been added to the testing procedure. A discretionary assessment made on the basis of Sirius participants’ experiences appears always to have been part of the selection. Psychological testing, a significant breakthrough, was added to the selection process in the late 1960s and it has played a prominent role ever since. During

This chapter focuses on the institutionalization of the European productivity agency (EPA) and its initial program, arguing that its establishment as an operational arm of the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (OEEC) in 1953 was primarily a US endeavor aimed at maintaining Europe within the ideology and epistemology of the capitalist West. Education thus constituted a key means of enculturation. This chapter examines the United States as a key driver of the agency’s institutionalization and reveals the resistance to its establishment. This chapter analyzes the concept of productivity as a form of ‘epistemological conveyer’ and shows that the EPA’s educational aspirations amount to a process of enculturation. This chapter concludes by exploring how the EPA, with its productivity drive involving and creating a web of change agents, can be seen as a precursor of the OECD’s educational programs. It hints at education as a subtle yet neglected dissemination mechanism and thereby highlights the largely ignored roots of the OECD’s operations, ideas, and educational agenda.

Historically, numerous contextual factors have influenced the practice of differentiating students. Scholars and practitioners consider it a context-sensitive practice subject to negotiations and entanglements among various agents, groups, interests, ideas, and values. Drawing on Foucault, this article pursues the practices, negotiations, and entanglements surrounding differentiation processes and IQ testing’s use in the early Danish welfare state. We argue that the differentiating practice of IQ testing in the Danish educational system resulted from various factors, including the increasing professionalisation of the educational system. This practice entailed an increased division of labour among professional groups; debates reflecting differing ideas about eugenics, heredity, and social equality; the schooling of psychologists and psychiatrists in Denmark; and the development of psychology and psychiatry as academic disciplines. In that sense, we will demonstrate that changes in society’s understanding of intelligence incorporating a greater use of environmental explanations can be said to reflect the emerging welfare society’s security mechanisms, and a willingness to cope with and address social inequality in an evolving and supposedly universalistic Danish welfare state.

Historically, numerous contextual factors have influenced the practice of differentiating students. Scholars and practitioners consider it a context-sensitive practice subject to negotiations and entanglements among various agents, groups, interests, ideas, and values. Drawing on Foucault, this article pursues the practices, negotiations, and entanglements surrounding differentiation processes and IQ testing’s use in the early Danish welfare state. We argue that the differentiating practice of IQ testing in the Danish educational system resulted from various factors, including the increasing professionalisation of the educational system. This practice entailed an increased division of labour among professional groups; debates reflecting differing ideas about eugenics, heredity, and social equality; the schooling of psychologists and psychiatrists in Denmark; and the development of psychology and psychiatry as academic disciplines. In that sense, we will demonstrate that changes in society’s understanding of intelligence incorporating a greater use of environmental explanations can be said to reflect the emerging welfare society’s security mechanisms, and a willingness to cope with and address social inequality in an evolving and supposedly universalistic Danish welfare state.

Historically, numerous contextual factors have influenced the practice of differentiating students. Scholars and practitioners consider it a context-sensitive practice subject to negotiations and entanglements among various agents, groups, interests, ideas, and values. Drawing on Foucault, this article pursues the practices, negotiations, and entanglements surrounding differentiation processes and IQ testing’s use in the early Danish welfare state. We argue that the differentiating practice of IQ testing in the Danish educational system resulted from various factors, including the increasing professionalisation of the educational system. This practice entailed an increased division of labour among professional groups; debates reflecting differing ideas about eugenics, heredity, and social equality; the schooling of psychologists and psychiatrists in Denmark; and the development of psychology and psychiatry as academic disciplines. In that sense, we will demonstrate that changes in society’s understanding of intelligence incorporating a greater use of environmental explanations can be said to reflect the emerging welfare society’s security mechanisms, and a willingness to cope with and address social inequality in an evolving and supposedly universalistic Danish welfare state.

Historically, numerous contextual factors have influenced the practice of differentiating students. Scholars and practitioners consider it a context-sensitive practice subject to negotiations and entanglements among various agents, groups, interests, ideas, and values. Drawing on Foucault, this article pursues the practices, negotiations, and entanglements surrounding differentiation processes and IQ testing’s use in the early Danish welfare state. We argue that the differentiating practice of IQ testing in the Danish educational system resulted from various factors, including the increasing professionalisation of the educational system. This practice entailed an increased division of labour among professional groups; debates reflecting differing ideas about eugenics, heredity, and social equality; the schooling of psychologists and psychiatrists in Denmark; and the development of psychology and psychiatry as academic disciplines. In that sense, we will demonstrate that changes in society’s understanding of intelligence incorporating a greater use of environmental explanations can be said to reflect the emerging welfare society’s security mechanisms, and a willingness to cope with and address social inequality in an evolving and supposedly universalistic Danish welfare state.

Historically, numerous contextual factors have influenced the practice of differentiating students. Scholars and practitioners consider it a context-sensitive practice subject to negotiations and entanglements among various agents, groups, interests, ideas, and values. Drawing on Foucault, this article pursues the practices, negotiations, and entanglements surrounding differentiation processes and IQ testing’s use in the early Danish welfare state. We argue that the differentiating practice of IQ testing in the Danish educational system resulted from various factors, including the increasing professionalisation of the educational system. This practice entailed an increased division of labour among professional groups; debates reflecting differing ideas about eugenics, heredity, and social equality; the schooling of psychologists and psychiatrists in Denmark; and the development of psychology and psychiatry as academic disciplines. In that sense, we will demonstrate that changes in society’s understanding of intelligence incorporating a greater use of environmental explanations can be said to reflect the emerging welfare society’s security mechanisms, and a willingness to cope with and address social inequality in an evolving and supposedly universalistic Danish welfare state.

Historically, numerous contextual factors have influenced the practice of differentiating students. Scholars and practitioners consider it a context-sensitive practice subject to negotiations and entanglements among various agents, groups, interests, ideas, and values. Drawing on Foucault, this article pursues the practices, negotiations, and entanglements surrounding differentiation processes and IQ testing’s use in the early Danish welfare state. We argue that the differentiating practice of IQ testing in the Danish educational system resulted from various factors, including the increasing professionalisation of the educational system. This practice entailed an increased division of labour among professional groups; debates reflecting differing ideas about eugenics, heredity, and social equality; the schooling of psychologists and psychiatrists in Denmark; and the development of psychology and psychiatry as academic disciplines. In that sense, we will demonstrate that changes in society’s understanding of intelligence incorporating a greater use of environmental explanations can be said to reflect the emerging welfare society’s security mechanisms, and a willingness to cope with and address social inequality in an evolving and supposedly universalistic Danish welfare state

Historically, numerous contextual factors have influenced the practice of differentiating students. Scholars and practitioners consider it a context-sensitive practice subject to negotiations and entanglements among various agents, groups, interests, ideas, and values. Drawing on Foucault, this article pursues the practices, negotiations, and entanglements surrounding differentiation processes and IQ testing’s use in the early Danish welfare state. We argue that the differentiating practice of IQ testing in the Danish educational system resulted from various factors, including the increasing professionalisation of the educational system. This practice entailed an increased division of labour among professional groups; debates reflecting differing ideas about eugenics, heredity, and social equality; the schooling of psychologists and psychiatrists in Denmark; and the development of psychology and psychiatry as academic disciplines. In that sense, we will demonstrate that changes in society’s understanding of intelligence incorporating a greater use of environmental explanations can be said to reflect the emerging welfare society’s security mechanisms, and a willingness to cope with and address social inequality in an evolving and supposedly universalistic Danish welfare state

This introductory article argues that practices of professional thinking and acting on the presence of the immigrant offer a privileged analytical prism through which to study how post-WWII European welfare nation-states have been shaped and crafted. As such, study of the formation of post-WWII welfare nation-states where one usually does not look for them is suggested: that is, beyond the bureaucratic logic imposed by the state itself. Consequently, a wedge is driven into the mundane professional practices embedded in the immigrant/welfare nation-state nexus, through which may be observed the very heterogeneous production of problems and solutions with immense effect on human lives, communities, and societies. These practices demonstrate the boundary work of the welfare nation-state that shapes it and gives shape to the construction and reconstruction of immigrant children and their families as problems and, thus, objects of integration and professional intervention. In this sense, the prism offers a new approach to writing histories of immigrant children’s education and the shaping and crafting of welfare nation-states that displaces both objects of study to professional practices of their making. In the first part of the article, the privileging of this analytical prism is substantiated historically and theoretically. In the second part, the four contributions constituting this themed issue are introduced. Finally there is a discussion of how the four contributions demonstrate the analytical prism’s cross-national relevance and historical sensitivity, adding new histories of how immigrant children’s education has been caught up in the immigrant/welfare nation-state nexus.

In the aftermath of the two world wars, strong international networks and organisations manifested themselves with promotion of peace through education on their agenda. Danish pedagogical experiments and experimental schools were strongly influenced by these trends and played a role in subsequent school practices and policies. Drawing on the notions of “the transnational” and “trading spaces” as well as the theoretical concepts of transfer, translation, and transformation, this article addresses the following research question: How were international ideas, knowledge and practice of promoting peace through education transferred, translated, and transformed in Danish school experiments in interwar and post-war scenarios? In exploring this question, the article uses transnational and Danish archival sources as well as journals and reports linked to the Danish progressive education movement. Thus, the article contributes to our understanding of the entanglements of educational ideas and to how trends of internationalisation and globalisation work.

In the aftermath of the two world wars, strong international networks and organisations manifested themselves with promotion of peace through education on their agenda. Danish pedagogical experiments and experimental schools were strongly influenced by these trends and played a role in subsequent school practices and policies. Drawing on the notions of “the transnational” and “trading spaces” as well as the theoretical concepts of transfer, translation, and transformation, this article addresses the following research question: How were international ideas, knowledge and practice of promoting peace through education transferred, translated, and transformed in Danish school experiments in interwar and post-war scenarios? In exploring this question, the article uses transnational and Danish archival sources as well as journals and reports linked to the Danish progressive education movement. Thus, the article contributes to our understanding of the entanglements of educational ideas and to how trends of internationalisation and globalisation work.

In the aftermath of the two world wars, strong international networks and organisations manifested themselves with promotion of peace through education on their agenda. Danish pedagogical experiments and experimental schools were strongly influenced by these trends and played a role in subsequent school practices and policies. Drawing on the notions of “the transnational” and “trading spaces” as well as the theoretical concepts of transfer, translation, and transformation, this article addresses the following research question: How were international ideas, knowledge and practice of promoting peace through education transferred, translated, and transformed in Danish school experiments in interwar and post-war scenarios? In exploring this question, the article uses transnational and Danish archival sources as well as journals and reports linked to the Danish progressive education movement. Thus, the article contributes to our understanding of the entanglements of educational ideas and to how trends of internationalisation and globalisation work.

In the aftermath of the two world wars, strong international networks and organisations manifested themselves with promotion of peace through education on their agenda. Danish pedagogical experiments and experimental schools were strongly influenced by these trends and played a role in subsequent school practices and policies. Drawing on the notions of “the transnational” and “trading spaces” as well as the theoretical concepts of transfer, translation, and transformation, this article addresses the following research question: How were international ideas, knowledge and practice of promoting peace through education transferred, translated, and transformed in Danish school experiments in interwar and post-war scenarios? In exploring this question, the article uses transnational and Danish archival sources as well as journals and reports linked to the Danish progressive education movement. Thus, the article contributes to our understanding of the entanglements of educational ideas and to how trends of internationalisation and globalisation work.

Emnet for denne artikel er de måder, hvorpå testning af elevernes evner og intelligens igennem de seneste godt hundrede år har fået en placering i skolens praksis og herigennem har bidraget til at definere, hvad det vil sige at være ’et barn’. Med analytisk afsæt i Michel Foucaults forståelse af diskursens magt-videns-formationer som det, der sætter rammerne for subjektiveringen, vil artiklen undersøge, hvordan de rationaler og praktikker, der knytter sig til testning af intelligens, har ændret sig over tid. Dette gøres igennem to historiske nedslag: I Binet og Simons intelligenstest, der blev udformet til testning (og udskillelse) af parisiske skolebørn i begyndelsen af 1900-tallet og i de måder, hvorpå Howard Gardners multible intelligensbegreb i kombination med Dunn & Dunns multible læringsforståelse igennem de seneste ca. 15 år har været anvendt til ’testning’ og undervisningsdifferentiering i den danske folkeskole. I artiklen vil vi følge den bevægelse, som vi med Foucault mener at kunne identificere, fra intelligenstestens ydre objektiverende (genstands-gørende) blik til selvevalueringens indre disciplinerende blik, hvor ’intelligens’ (uanset antal og form) bliver et spørgsmål om individets selvdisciplinering. Igennem analysen mener vi at kunne identificere, at denne bevægelse går fra ’det selekterede barn’ til ’det selvevaluerende barn’. Med individuelle læringsstile og multible intelligenser er der med andre ord tale om at ydre overvågning er transformeret til selvdisciplinering på diskursens præmisser: elevens ansvar-for-egen-læring.

This paper contributes knowledge creation on two different, but intimately linked, levels. The first is an analytical level and the second is a methodological level. At the analytical level the paper addresses the issue of understanding how Danish-ness is constructed in two historical settings characterized by great upheavals in popular moral codes, culture and national self-imagery. The first setting is the first decade after World War II and the second setting is the post-9/11 era. The empirical focus is on the way police officers and adjoining professionals of the Danish welfare nation-state construct ‘disturbing/disquieting behavior’, delinquency, and misbehavior and how these constructions are made into a category that activates educational and other interventions. Using a comparative outlook between the two historical settings the purpose is to understand 1) the boundaries of legitimate behavior and membership of the Danish community inside the Danish welfare nation-state, and 2) the transformations of these boundaries according to the Danish state’s changing (inter-state) relations within the regional and global community. At the methodological level the paper works with the research question of how it is possible to adequately bring two different types of sources from two different periods to communicate in order to conduct history research on the construction of Danishness across the periods?

The first part under the headline ‘Theory and the construction of the research object’ will clarify our concept of theory and the Bourdieusian and Wacquantian way of working with theory and theoretical constructions when doing empirical and historical work as basis for the article’s chain of reasoning. The second part titled ‘Theoretical concepts: State, Profession, Immigrant’ aims at presenting and clarifying the triad ‘state – profession – immigrant’ through the conceptual lens of state as a bureaucratic field and state-crafting. The third part designated ‘Working with historical sources’ consists of three subsections altogether. The first addresses in brief the question of putting the theoretical model into work empirically focussing on the concept of field to avoid determinism and presentism when working with a com-prehensive theoretical framework. The second and third subsections takes the reader into the very ‘engine room’ of historical research using the work with interview data and archival data, alt-hough actual research findings are left out. The conclusion sums up the findings of the article and communicates the lessons learned from this research endeavour.

This paper contributes knowledge creation on two different, but intimately linked, levels. The first is an analytical level and the second is a methodological level. At the analytical level the paper addresses the issue of understanding how Danish-ness is constructed in two historical settings characterized by great upheavals in popular moral codes, culture and national self-imagery. The first setting is the first decade after World War II and the second setting is the post-9/11 era. The empirical focus is on the way police officers and adjoining professionals of the Danish welfare nation-state construct ‘disturbing/disquieting behavior’, delinquency, and misbehavior and how these constructions are made into a category that activates educational and other interventions. Using a comparative outlook between the two historical settings the purpose is to understand 1) the boundaries of legitimate behavior and membership of the Danish community inside the Danish welfare nation-state, and 2) the transformations of these boundaries according to the Danish state’s changing (inter-state) relations within the regional and global community. At the methodological level the paper works with the research question of how it is possible to adequately bring two different types of sources from two different periods to communicate in order to conduct history research on the construction of Danishness across the periods?

In the aftermath of the two world wars, strong international networks and organisations manifested themselves with promotion of peace through education on their agenda. Danish pedagogical experiments and experimental schools were strongly influenced by these trends and played a role in subsequent school practices and policies. Drawing on the notions of “the transnational” and “trading spaces” as well as the theoretical concepts of transfer, translation, and transformation, this article addresses the following research question: How were international ideas, knowledge and practice of promoting peace through education transferred, translated, and transformed in Danish school experiments in interwar and post-war scenarios? In exploring this question, the article uses transnational and Danish archival sources as well as journals and reports linked to the Danish progressive education movement. Thus, the article contributes to our understanding of the entanglements of educational ideas and to how trends of internationalisation and globalisation work.

Evaluation Practices of the Danish Public School System in International Perspective, 1945-1990 Following World War II, international organizations and cross-border connections have played a significant role in the development of education in general and test and evaluations in particular. Many changes in the Danish post-war education system, such as education for peace, teaching in democracy, the comprehensive school and the development of educational psychology, were shaped in dialogue with or even initiated in international forums. However, this international perspective is not very prevalent in the existing research.This article throws light on how international collaboration on educational tests and evaluations in Denmark took place took after 1945. At first through informal networks and later, when these networks and their pioneering spirit increasingly became institutionalized in the 1950s and 1960s. In subsequent years the significant development took place in international organizations. The article also argues that international organizations had a special focus on the importance of basic schooling for children’s socialization and Bildung in the first part of the period. Test and evaluations were used for this purpose. While in the last part of the period focus shifted to measuring pupil performance used in international hierarchizations as a measure of quality.

In this article, we argue that an understanding of the interwar years and the ascent of educational psychology contribute valuable knowledge about the inner workings of modern-day education with regard to the links between society and education in general and the boundary between normality and deviation in particular. The establishment of the educational psychologist’s office at Frederiksberg in Denmark, the introduction of IQ testing, and the related psychological files of students provide an image of a period of measurement in schools during which IQ testing was decisive in decisions to transfer students to the remedial school. The testing and filing were the foremost important technologies of the period. We draw on sources that allow us to view educational psychology and testing in their local, national, and political context. The sources applied are primarily obtained from Frederiksberg City Archive that contains archives from the Educational Psychology Office.

In this article, we argue that an understanding of the interwar years and the ascent of educational psychology contribute valuable knowledge about the inner workings of modern-day education with regard to the links between society and education in general and the boundary between normality and deviation in particular. The establishment of the educational psychologist’s office at Frederiksberg in Denmark, the introduction of IQ testing, and the related psychological files of students provide an image of a period of measurement in schools during which IQ testing was decisive in decisions to transfer students to the remedial school. The testing and filing were the foremost important technologies of the period. We draw on sources that allow us to view educational psychology and testing in their local, national, and political context. The sources applied are primarily obtained from Frederiksberg City Archive that contains archives from the Educational Psychology Office.

In this article, we argue that an understanding of the interwar years and the ascent of educational psychology contribute valuable knowledge about the inner workings of modern-day education with regard to the links between society and education in general and the boundary between normality and deviation in particular. The establishment of the educational psychologist’s office at Frederiksberg in Denmark, the introduction of IQ testing, and the related psychological files of students provide an image of a period of measurement in schools during which IQ testing was decisive in decisions to transfer students to the remedial school. The testing and filing were the foremost important technologies of the period. We draw on sources that allow us to view educational psychology and testing in their local, national, and political context. The sources applied are primarily obtained from Frederiksberg City Archive that contains archives from the Educational Psychology Office.

Post-crisis perspectives refer to scenarios after a crisis, possible options of dealing with them, and the importance for defining these scenarios. This anthology seeks to identify paths and perspectives that go beyond the contemporary economic crisis. In searching for a post-crisis perspective it is necessary to deduce how the world/society/economics/institutions could/should be set up/organized on the other side of the economic crisis. What are the viable lines of continuation and stability? Which functions are beneficial and which are not? How should we think about money, debt, institutions, politics, and the Common? The contributions which make up this anthology offer valuable concepts and frameworks for thinking about all these questions and post-crisis society.

Post-crisis perspectives refer to scenarios after a crisis, possible options of dealing with them, and the importance for defining these scenarios. This anthology seeks to identify paths and perspectives that go beyond the contemporary economic crisis. In searching for a post-crisis perspective it is necessary to deduce how the world/society/economics/institutions could/should be set up/organized on the other side of the economic crisis. What are the viable lines of continuation and stability? Which functions are beneficial and which are not? How should we think about money, debt, institutions, politics, and the Common? The contributions which make up this anthology offer valuable concepts and frameworks for thinking about all these questions and post-crisis society.

Post-crisis perspectives refer to scenarios after a crisis, possible options of dealing with them, and the importance for defining these scenarios. This anthology seeks to identify paths and perspectives that go beyond the contemporary economic crisis. In searching for a post-crisis perspective it is necessary to deduce how the world/society/economics/institutions could/should be set up/organized on the other side of the economic crisis. What are the viable lines of continuation and stability? Which functions are beneficial and which are not? How should we think about money, debt, institutions, politics, and the Common? The contributions which make up this anthology offer valuable concepts and frameworks for thinking about all these questions and post-crisis society.

Post-crisis perspectives refer to scenarios after a crisis, possible options of dealing with them, and the importance for defining these scenarios. This anthology seeks to identify paths and perspectives that go beyond the contemporary economic crisis. In searching for a post-crisis perspective it is necessary to deduce how the world/society/economics/institutions could/should be set up/organized on the other side of the economic crisis. What are the viable lines of continuation and stability? Which functions are beneficial and which are not? How should we think about money, debt, institutions, politics, and the Common? The contributions which make up this anthology offer valuable concepts and frameworks for thinking about all these questions and post-crisis society.

Post-crisis perspectives refer to scenarios after a crisis, possible options of dealing with them, and the importance for defining these scenarios. This anthology seeks to identify paths and perspectives that go beyond the contemporary economic crisis. In searching for a post-crisis perspective it is necessary to deduce how the world/society/economics/institutions could/should be set up/organized on the other side of the economic crisis. What are the viable lines of continuation and stability? Which functions are beneficial and which are not? How should we think about money, debt, institutions, politics, and the Common? The contributions which make up this anthology offer valuable concepts and frameworks for thinking about all these questions and post-crisis society.

In this article, we argue that an understanding of the interwar years and the ascent of educational psychology contribute valuable knowledge about the inner workings of modern-day education with regard to the links between society and education in general and the boundary between normality and deviation in particular. The establishment of the educational psychologist’s office at Frederiksberg in Denmark, the introduction of IQ testing, and the related psychological files of students provide an image of a period of measurement in schools during which IQ testing was decisive in decisions to transfer students to the remedial school. The testing and filing were the foremost important technologies of the period. We draw on sources that allow us to view educational psychology and testing in their local, national, and political context. The sources applied are primarily obtained from Frederiksberg City Archive that contains archives from the Educational Psychology Office.

In this article, we argue that an understanding of the interwar years and the ascent of educational psychology contribute valuable knowledge about the inner workings of modern-day education with regard to the links between society and education in general and the boundary between normality and deviation in particular. The establishment of the educational psychologist’s office at Frederiksberg in Denmark, the introduction of IQ testing, and the related psychological files of students provide an image of a period of measurement in schools during which IQ testing was decisive in decisions to transfer students to the remedial school. The testing and filing were the foremost important technologies of the period. We draw on sources that allow us to view educational psychology and testing in their local, national, and political context. The sources applied are primarily obtained from Frederiksberg City Archive that contains archives from the Educational Psychology Office.

In Norway, Sweden and Denmark national testing communities advocating the introduction and expanded use of standardised educational tests in the national educational systems emerged around World War I. Using international research and cross-border networking activities, these coteries were able to gain power and thus establish and promote a new profession, the educational psychologist, along with instituting practices of alleged scientific tests in the following decades. This article presents a historical analysis of the central processes and developments constituting the Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish testing communities. The aim is to understand the workings of these professionalization movements rooted in the creation of an international fellowship of like-mindedness and a knowledge monopoly connected with standardised educational tests. Viewed from a contemporary perspective, this type of analysis is relevant, because specialised knowledge and experts with knowledge monopolies remain prevalent in the modern-day field of education policy and practice. Thus, the roots of this inherent tendency towards expert knowledge in modern welfare state educational settings can be more adequately grasped through a better understanding of the historical precursors. The article discusses the importance and actual impact of the Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish testing communities on national educational practices, the significance of the international interplay, and how and to what extent national political and educational climates were shaped by new experts and knowledge. It is argued that the testing communities were able to gain authority in the national educational fields through the creation and maintenance of organisations, knowledge, and practices, as well as in the forming of alliances with politicians, universities, and teachers’ unions in a joint endeavour that promoted educational psychology and testing in the three Scandinavian educational fields.

In Norway, Sweden and Denmark national testing communities advocating the introduction and expanded use of standardised educational tests in the national educational systems emerged around World War I. Using international research and cross-border networking activities, these coteries were able to gain power and thus establish and promote a new profession, the educational psychologist, along with instituting practices of alleged scientific tests in the following decades. This article presents a historical analysis of the central processes and developments constituting the Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish testing communities. The aim is to understand the workings of these professionalization movements rooted in the creation of an international fellowship of like-mindedness and a knowledge monopoly connected with standardised educational tests. Viewed from a contemporary perspective, this type of analysis is relevant, because specialised knowledge and experts with knowledge monopolies remain prevalent in the modern-day field of education policy and practice. Thus, the roots of this inherent tendency towards expert knowledge in modern welfare state educational settings can be more adequately grasped through a better understanding of the historical precursors. The article discusses the importance and actual impact of the Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish testing communities on national educational practices, the significance of the international interplay, and how and to what extent national political and educational climates were shaped by new experts and knowledge. It is argued that the testing communities were able to gain authority in the national educational fields through the creation and maintenance of organisations, knowledge, and practices, as well as in the forming of alliances with politicians, universities, and teachers’ unions in a joint endeavour that promoted educational psychology and testing in the three Scandinavian educational fields.