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The purpose of this research paper is to investigate how technology has influenced the economic growth of developing countries and what steps are needed to be implemented in the regions of the world such as Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa. The paper reflects the arguments and the conclusions brought up during the discussion with a student roundtable answering the general research question; 'Are certain developing countries doomed to remain emerging'? In answering this question, the group identified four factors for economic growth: (1) human resources, (2) natural resources, (3) physical capital and (4) technology. Of the four factors technology was the single most significant factor for economic growth in developing countries, although the others are just as important. The group concluded that countries that lead the world in generating advanced technologies and leveraging their full productive capacity can gain a strategic comparative advantage and become an advanced country. Innovation and entrepreneurship are crucial for long-term economic development.

A documentary review was conducted on the production and publication of research papers on studying the variable Digital Transformation, Education and COVID-19. The bibliometric analysis proposed in this document aims to know the main characteristics of the volume of publications registered in the Scopus database from 2020 to 2022, achieving the identification of 464 publications in total. The information provided by this platform was organized using tables and figures, categorizing the information by Year of Publication, Country of Origin, Area of Knowledge and Type of Publication. Once these characteristics were described, the position of different authors regarding the proposed topic was referenced through qualitative analysis. Among the main findings of this research, it is found that Spain, with 49 publications, was the country with the highest global production. The area of knowledge that made the most significant contribution to the construction of bibliographic material related to the study of Digital Transformation, Education and COVID-19 was the area of Social Sciences with 253 published documents, and the type of publication that was most used during the period mentioned above was the journal article, representing 54% of the total scientific production.

Background: Within the current labor market, continuously changing and accelerating since the COVID-19 crisis (World Economic Forum, 2021), the educational system must offer a pedagogical alternative to face and anticipate these 21st century changes and demands (OECD, 2018). Based on the four-dimensional education framework, from the Center for Curriculum Redesign (CCR), the online learning literature, and students' perspectives, the Beyond Education (BE) organization has proposed a series of interactive online pedagogical programs aiming to develop 21st-century competencies in school-age students. Methods: The aim of this paper is to propose both quantitative and qualitative data analyses of the first pilot program: "BE a Global Citizen" through a semi-experimental study, using a mixed-method approach, analyzing the pre- and post-tests results of 26 students aged 16 to 18 years old. Results: Analyses presented evidence of the program's efficacy at developing 21st century competencies in students, particularly those competencies targeted by the program, which were significantly increased. Conclusions: Although these are promising results, a replicability study needs to be done on a larger sample in order to generalize the results.

Students' action competence must be taught and developed, particularly for prospective science teachers, to have a pedagogical perspective as environmental educators. As indicated by publications in respected journals, researchers' focus and alignment on the issue of action competence are highly expected. This systematic literature review aims to compare the findings of research articles published by Web of Science-indexed journals. The keyword used to find the articles on the Web of Science's database was "action competence," which discovered 193 publications. Furthermore, 25 articles met the criteria to be analyzed. Preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analysis was the inclusion and exclusion model used. In the last three years, research focused on action competence has increased. The research employed several methods, i.e., qualitative, quantitative, mixed-methods, and development research. Jelle Boevede Pauw and Wanda Sass were the authors who frequently published research that focused on action competence. The keyword action competence was directly associated with environmental education, sustainable development, education-based learning for sustainable development, and evaluation. The authors who published their research with this focus were from 16 countries, mainly from Europe, i.e., Sweden, Belgium, and Denmark. The continent diversity of authors who contributed articles indicated that the action competence issue had become a global concern. Furthermore, it was found that the number of non-collaborating publications (universities or countries) was higher than those collaborating, even though single authors rarely wrote the articles. The recent trend shows that publications are authored by scientists with various backgrounds such as fields, universities, and even countries. The authors of this paper developed and proposed eight ideas to be reflected by prospective science teachers or science teacher education providers in educating future science teachers concerned about action competence about sustainable development.

The study discussed in this paper is a systematic literature review related to the role of dual language programme (DLP) in mathematics education which has been published within the last 5 years. This study was conducted to identify the distribution of DLP studies in terms of year of publication, the study context covered in previous studies, the context of study areas used, focus and trends of past studies, research methods used in previous studies and the role of language in school mathematics education. This review study followed the guidelines of Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyzes (PRISMA) to analyze articles from Scopus and Web of Science. The findings of the study indicate that research trends in the implementation of the DLP on mathematics education for secondary school students showed an increase from 2017 to 2019. Most DLP-related articles are widely developed in the United States and Germany. The findings indicate that previous studies are more interested in studying the implementation of DLP in rural areas. Past studies have also preferred to use the design of either a qualitative study or a quantitative study to be implemented. Questionnaires, tests and interviews are among the research instruments that are often used for a study.

In this paper we consider the experiences of international students studying in Norway, analysing data from more than 5,000 survey respondents. Variations according to students' region of origin and whether they are full degree students or exchange students are the focus. Students report a high level of overall satisfaction, exchange students in particular, and the vast majority of students are content with the quality of teaching. Students from the African continent report being more content than others, despite struggling somewhat more with academic demands and having weaker social networks, something they have in common with Asian students. Multivariate analyses show that type of mobility (full degree cf. exchange), region of origin, coping with academic demands, satisfaction with teaching and interaction with Norwegians are predictors of overall satisfaction with studying in Norway. The patterns observed are assumed to be related to prior experiences and expectations.

The importance of inclusive education receives global acceptance. The current paper presents a bibliometric analysis of 8398 papers dealing with inclusive education between 1980 and 2019. The research aim is to gain information on scientific productivity, international collaboration activities, and the conceptual structure of this research field. Descriptive analyses, co-authorship collaboration analysis and co-word analysis were conducted to obtain a comprehensive knowledge map of inclusive education research. The results show a fast growing body of research in inclusive education over the years with intensive international collaboration patterns. Six research clusters could be identified. Major and intensively studied research themes are disability issues, teacher professionalisation, teacher practices, attitudes towards inclusive education, social processes, support, curricular issues, student perspective, parent perspective, intercultural education, policy, etc. Research addressing inclusive education from a queer perspective, bullying, stigmatisation, digital education and emerging technologies in inclusive settings are under-represented and should be intensified in future studies.

Research on augmented reality (AR) in education is gaining momentum worldwide. This field has been actively growing over the past decades in terms of the research and development of new technologies. Reviews in the field of AR in education consist of systematic literature reviews and meta-analyses (around 45), surveys (around 33), and only one bibliometric analysis. However, these reviews do not provide a general synthesis of the research published in the field to depict its evolution over the years. This study used the metadata of articles from a 25-year period (1995-2020) to conduct a bibliometric analysis. A total of 3,475 studies were considered. In this study, we used tools such as the Scopus database, the bibliometrix R package, and the VOSviewer analysis tool. The analysis of the literature is based on the metadata, author, content, and citation information extracted from the dataset. In addition, we focus on comparing literature published mainly in journals (articles, articles in press, and reviews) and those published in other sources (conference papers, books, and book chapters). Practitioners could use the results of this study to make decisions about the adoption of AR technologies in education.

This paper revisits the relationship between human capital and income inequality, using an updated data set on human capital inequality and a novel database on earnings inequality. We find an inverted U-shaped relationship between these two inequality indicators, but with significant differences across countries regarding the turning point. Skill-biased technological change is found to be an additional force that may blur the relationship between human capital and earnings inequality. Over and above the effect exerted through earnings inequality, the paper shows that human capital inequality has a direct positive effect on income inequality.

The paper addresses the impact of COVID-19 on vocational education and training, seeking to discern the outline of possible directions for its future development within the debates about VET responses to the pandemic. The discussion is set in its socio-economic context, considering debates that engage with the social relations of care and neo-liberalism. The paper analyses discourses that have developed around VET across the world during the pandemic, illustrating both possible continuities and ruptures that may emerge in this field, as the health crisis becomes overshadowed in public policy by the prioritisation of economic recovery and social restoration. The paper concludes that, alongside the possibility of a narrowing of VET to its most prosaic aims and practices, the health crisis could also lead to a re-conceptualisation that develops its radical and emancipatory possibilities in both the global south and north.

This paper presents research on girls' and boys' gendered perceptions of their learning during school closures due to COVID-19. The research was conducted in ten countries affected by displacement across Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America. We applied statistical analysis using multivariate logistic regression models from the results of a survey conducted with parents or caregivers and their children. We complemented the quantitative study with qualitative methodology, which provided a nuanced understanding of girls' and boys' perceptions of their learning and their voiced concerns during the COVID-19-related school closures. Our results show that the children in the displaced settings are likely to perceive a decline in learning during the pandemic, and that the factors influencing this perception differ between boys and girls. Girls' perceptions of learning "nothing" or only "a little bit" were more strongly associated with material barriers, such as limited access to learning materials and household economic circumstances, than was the case for boys. The boys' experience of learning "a little bit" or "nothing" was more strongly associated with increased negative feelings, including feeling sad or worried, increased violence in the home, and increased responsibility for looking after siblings or other children. This research notes the importance of supporting displaced children by providing adequate resources to enable equitable access to learning, and calls for cross-sectoral programming to support displaced children who are dealing with emotional pressure.

Numerous studies in different science fields have examined the various aspects of educational interventions designed to facilitate learning outcomes in students with dyslexia. The aim of this study was to present an overview of empirical research related to interventions aimed at primary school students with dyslexia. Mapping was conducted to identify studies on this topic published from 2015 to 2019 and included in the Scopus database. The descriptive data from 57 studies were analyzed to present a classification scheme of research design, type of educational intervention, implementation of technology in educational interventions, and aim of the intervention. The results indicated an increasing trend in the last 5 years in the publication of papers in researched areas related to educational interventions for students with dyslexia, with uneven representation among countries. The analyzed empirical studies were mostly analytic, using different designs, with a slightly higher prevalence of (quasi) experimental versus descriptive designs. As expected, the goal of most educational interventions was directed toward the development of (pre)reading skills, with a wider prevalence of structured language-based programs, followed by software specialized to support learning, whereas adaptations of instructional materials and innovative information and communication technology (ICT) were less used. Mapping indicated the frequent use of ICT in all educational interventions, and more evidence is needed for complex rigorous experimental designs and interventions related to teaching in the classroom, as well as interventions aimed at facilitating the self-regulation of students with dyslexia.

Calls continue for the decolonisation of higher education (HE). Based on internationalisation debates, a research team from Africa, Europe and Latin America reviewed published decolonisation voices. Using bibliometric analysis and a conceptual review of abstracts, the authors examined the drivers framing decolonisation in HE and identified the voices in those debates which involved the historically oppressed and those wishing to elicit change in these debates. The paper recognises the importance for decolonisation in education as the tensions explored by the authors often intersect through HE into other domains of the political, social, economic and culturally important areas for replication and change in society.

The theory of planned behaviour (TPB) captures important individual beliefs (attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behaviour control), which influence people's intentions towards performing a given behaviour. Due to the successful application of TPB to a number of areas of human activity, it has been adopted as a framework in a number of studies assessing teachers' intentions towards implementing inclusive education. However, little work has been done to synthesise these studies. In this study, we reviewed published studies on inclusive education (2007 to 2019), which used the TPB as a framework to understand reporting trends and identify research gaps. We followed the guidelines for the preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA). Five keywords were used to search for studies in nine databases, which resulted in the identification of 604 papers, of which 22 satisfied the pre-set inclusion and quality assessment criteria. Although the findings from some studies confirm the ability of TPB to predict teachers' intentions, the link between the predictors and actual behaviour was unclear. Moreover, there was divergence between the findings of the qualitative and quantitative studies. Limitations, recommendations for future studies and implications for inclusive practice are discussed.

Purpose: The Farmer Field School (FFS) has been used to enable farmers to adapt their farming decisions according to the field situation. This paper explores the methodological state, challenges and lessons learned, of the FFS around the World. Design/methodology/approach: We used a 52-item questionnaire to capture issues of design, implementation and evaluation of the FFS. Completed questionnaires were received from 57 ongoing or recent FFS programmes. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics. Findings: FFS programmes have diversified, including multiple crops and livestock. Farmer involvement in the design and planning of interventions was found to be critical. FFS programmes increasingly relied on farmers as FFS facilitators. Short training duration for FFS facilitators raised concern about FFS quality. Even though mechanisms for monitoring and evaluation were mostly in place, capacity for data analysis and data utilization were a concern. Practical implications: Results highlight strengths and shortcomings in design, implementation and evaluation of the FFS. The information acquired can be used to support the quality of ongoing and future programmes. Theoretical implications: This research contributed to understanding that the educational foundations of the FFS should be reflected in programme design and evaluation. Originality/value: Many studies of the FFS exist, but this is the first global overview on how farmer field school programmes are carried out, with various lessons learned.

This paper utilizes a climate justice perspective to examine municipal green bonds (MGBs), a green-labelled debt instrument issued by subnational governmental entities, such as municipalities or cities, that determines financial, social and environmental redistributions in the context of climate change. This analysis focuses on the origins and financial construction of MGBs as the "descendant" of US municipal bonds and provides data on their recent diffusion in Africa and Latin America. It then draws connections with the lessons learned from critical analyses of US municipal bonds. The case study section explores one wastewater MGB of San Francisco (California) and creates material and theoretical connections with MGBs issued to finance water infrastructure in Mexico City (Mexico) and Cape Town (South Africa). The article concludes that the analysis and implementation of municipal green bonds needs a climate justice approach in order to recognize and address the production and reproduction of climate injustices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the study, which investigates the potential synergies between private banks and aid donors in developing countries. A survey of private bank lending towards developing countries was undertaken to identify the private banks most active in those economies and provide an analytical tool to help identify the scope for public and private partnerships. Researchers found that an international division of labour in bank lending: within the developing world, banks from OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation & Development) countries tend to focus their credit on specific regions and countries.

The rapid scaling up of all forms of sustainable finance has become a priority of the international community. This task is especially crucial for gender lens investing (GLI), whose growth in low- and middle-income countries—though dynamic, innovative, and gaining momentum—remains too slow, fragmented, and Northern-driven, not only in terms of the origin of capital but also in its design and implementation. This special issue of multidisciplinary papers contributes to pushing the frontiers of GLI growth forward in five areas: the role and scope of GLI; the importance of the care economy; GLI implementation strategies; Southern-led, women-led capital mobilization; and the interactions of gender and performance in investee firms. Driven by reciprocal scholar-practitioner partnerships, future research on the growth of gender lens investing in emerging markets should be Southern directed, methodologically plural, anchored in open data, and actionable in real time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 1980s, inequality has been rising in Europe, North America and parts of Asia. How does our understanding of global inequality dynamics change if coverage is extended to the rest of the developing world? To rebalance the perspective on global inequality trends, this paper surveys data and literature on recent inequality trends in Latin America, Asia, Africa and the Middle East. It finds that in these regions there are more countries with falling than rising inequality over the past 20 years, as measured by Ginis of income or consumption inequality. At the global level, therefore, there are signs of inequality convergence, as inequality has been falling in countries with high inequality in the 1990s (particularly Latin America), and rising in historically low-inequality countries. We discuss the political and economic drivers of inequality decline in countries with a steady fall in the Gini. This suggests some common trends across the globe, including the role of democratisation, the rise of new social movements, and the expansion of education and social safety nets and favourable commodity prices, in reducing income disparities. This paper calls for more country-level comparisons of inequality trends, to highlight the multiplicity of paths in this latest phase of globalisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Background: Psoriatic arthritis (PsA) is a challenging heterogeneous disease. The European League Against Rheumatism (EULAR) and the Group for Research and Assessment of Psoriasis and PsA (GRAPPA) last published their respective recommendations for the management of PsA in 2015. However, these guidelines are primarily based on studies conducted in resource replete countries and may not be applicable in countries in the Americas (except Canada and USA) and Africa. We sought to adapt the existing recommendations for these regions under the auspices of the International League of Associations for Rheumatology (ILAR). Process: The ADAPTE Collaboration (2009) process for guideline adaptation was followed to adapt the EULAR and GRAPPA PsA treatment recommendations for the Americas and Africa. The process was conducted in three recommended phases: set-up phase; adaptation phase (defining health questions, assessing source recommendations, drafting report), and finalization phase (external review, aftercare planning, and final production). Result: ILAR recommendations have been derived principally by adapting the GRAPPA recommendations, additionally, EULAR recommendations where appropriate and supplemented by expert opinion and literature from these regions. A paucity of data relevant to resource-poor settings was found in PsA management literature. Conclusion: The ILAR Treatment Recommendations for PsA intends to serve as reference for the management of PsA in the Americas and Africa. This paper illustrates the experience of an international working group in adapting existing recommendations to a resource-poor setting. It highlights the need to conduct research on the management of PsA in these regions as data are currently lacking. Key Points • The paper presents adapted recommendations for the management of psoriatic arthritis in resource-poor settings. • The ADAPTE process was used to adapt existing GRAPPA and EULAR recommendations by collaboration with practicing clinicians from the Americas and Africa. • The evidence from resource-poor settings to answer clinically relevant questions was scant or non-existent; hence, a research agenda is proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the nonlinear relationship between tourism and economic growth using a balanced sample of 58 countries in three continental samples (Africa, Asia, and Latin America) for the 2003–2017 period. First, we document an asymmetric threshold effect of tourism on economic growth. By utilizing an endogenous threshold regression model, we show that a single tourism threshold cutoff exists and that tourism receipts influence growth only till the threshold cutoff point in all three continental samples; however, this influence is nonexistent past the threshold point. Second, a quantile effect decomposition shows separate marginal effects for the tourism and economic growth relationship across the growth distribution. By using an unconditional quantile regression approach, we show that compared to their regional cohorts, slow- and medium-growth African countries, slow-growth Asian countries, and medium-growth Latin American countries exhibit substantially higher economic growth benefits from tourism. We explain these empirical observations and discuss their policy implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past two decades, China has become a strategic economic partner for both Latin American and African nations. China's economic global relevance is translating via its "Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)" into massive amounts of foreign trade, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), loans, and aid for both regions. Recently, China has added a national security and defense dimension to its BRI relationship with both regions. China's global strategic economic, geopolitical, and global defense goals are being expressed in its global "Road and Belt" power initiatives and strategies. This paper explores an additional dimension of China's BRI initiative: its role in both regions' defense industries and national security environments. China is increasingly using its trade and investment leverage with both regions to unbalance their defense choices and strategic defense relationships. China's increasing interactions with African and Latin American countries poses a number of geopolitical implications for both the United States and Western European countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper scrutinizes current processes of urban fragmentation, segregation, and exclusion that result from the increasing flows of capital in gated communities, walled-off condominiums, and similar exclusivist investment hubs in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa. Gated communitylike developments are growing and spreading into new areas. Although not all of the walled projects offer all-inclusiveness, they are unanimously based on the pre-selection of specific categories of residents. Moreover, all-inclusive urban developments are taking on new and more encompassing forms, such as 'gated cities'. Hence, socio-spatial inclusion and exclusion in the urban built environment are continuously transforming under the influence of investment capital (i.e., new urban investment flows and speculation), urbanistic concepts (e.g., different interpretations of safety and crime), and human mobilities. This paper builds on a comparison of empirical cases from Latin America and Africa to develop a qualitative framework of segregation indicators. In Latin America, gated communities have a long history, but exclusionary developments are changing in form, as well as in implications. In Africa, research on gated communities has particularly focused on South Africa (where they have a longer history), but exclusionary developments are spreading rapidly across the continent, and will influence future real estate development and land markets. Based on such complementary experiences, this paper grapples with the question of how these new all-inclusive developments influence the possibilities of achieving inclusive and sustainable urban transitions, as advocated in Sustainable Development Goal 11 (SDG11) and the New Urban Agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the findings of a literature review on public private partnerships (PPPs) in two sectors - education and health - in Africa, Asia and Latin America. It highlights the heterogeneity of the category within and across sectors and shows that the key predictions of the PPP doctrine - cost-efficiency for improved social service delivery to the poor - are hardly fulfilled in practice. Moreover, PPPs - both as policy model and practical arrangements - are underpinned by a narrow conception of education and health, which denies their broader embeddedness within the economy and society. The paper identifies theoretical and methodological limitations of the existing scholarship. It underlines the scarcity of data on the corporate sector and, more broadly, about the economics of education and health PPPs. It also stresses the little attention paid to the beneficiaries. The paper finally calls for further research to open up the 'black box' of PPPs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces Kohonen self-organizing maps to the scholarly discussion of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). We use data through the MDGs' approximate mid-point (2000–2008) to analyze three world regions: Africa, Asia and Latin America. We observe a handful of countries that showcase noteworthy progress, including Ghana, Senegal, China, Vietnam, India, and Brazil, and then examine more closely the three major regions of developing countries: Africa, Latin America, and Asia. Major statistical differences within Africa separate the northern and southern regions from the central, eastern and western regions. In contrast, Latin America and Asia are largely homogeneous in the MDG measures with the exceptions of Afghanistan, Haiti, and Bolivia, which lag far behind. The substantial differences between Africa and the other continents (and indeed within Africa itself) appear to be mainly attributable to deficiencies in education and information and communications technology infrastructure, both areas that are imperative for the achievement of other MDGs. The paper demonstrates self-organizing maps to be a useful tool in evaluating differential convergence over the three time periods under investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article provides a comparative review of historical economic inequality in the two most unequal regions of the world, namely Latin America and Africa. This contribution examines novel studies that provide quantitative estimates of income and/or wealth inequality in the two continents in terms of sources, methods, results and interpretations, focusing on the period 1650 to 1950. The article shows that although scholars in the two regions have often employed similar methodologies, their results are far from conforming to a uniform pattern. The present review highlights how scholars of Latin America and Africa tend to remain geographically isolated, failing to capture the learning opportunities stemming from the work of their continental counterparts in terms of both sources and methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) is a key component of efforts to improve sexual and reproductive outcomes for young people. While many governments have established policies and curricula for CSE, there are no quantitative measures of the quality of their implementation in schools. We describe the construction of a school-level index to measure CSE implementation quality using data from Peru, Guatemala, Kenya and Ghana for validation. The composite index represents seven key components of a successful programme: range of topics, values imparted, teaching methods, teacher training, resources available, monitoring and evaluation, and the school environment. These components are combined into two sub-indices (curriculum content and implementation context), which together provide a summary index of implementation quality. We present scores for the seven components, the two sub-indices and the summary index for each country. Ghana scored highest on the summary index, while Guatemala scored lowest, but country rankings varied within the different components. The paper discusses the implications of the findings for improving school-based CSE in these countries. An assessment of the validity and reliability of the index indicates it can be used in other settings and could be a useful tool for educationalists, researchers and programme implementers to measure CSE implementation quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The successful implementation of comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) programmes in schools depends on the development and implementation of strong policy in support of CSE. This paper offers a comparative analysis of the policy environment governing school-based CSE in four low- and middle-income countries at different stages of programme implementation: Ghana, Peru, Kenya and Guatemala. Based on an analysis of current policy and legal frameworks, key informant interviews and recent regional reviews, the analysis focuses on seven policy-related levers that contribute to successful school-based sexuality education programmes. The levers cover policy development trends; current policy and legal frameworks for sexuality education; international commitments affecting CSE policies; the various actors involved in shaping CSE; and the partnerships and coalitions of actors that influence CSE policy. Our analysis shows that all four countries benefit from a policy environment that, if properly leveraged, could lead to a stronger implementation of CSE in schools. However, each faces several key challenges that must be addressed to ensure the health and wellbeing of their young people. Latin American and African countries show notable differences in the development and evolution of their CSE policy environments, providing valuable insights for programme development and implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper seeks to present a world regional approach to the analysis of modernity and in doing so it also aims to make a contribution to comparative sociology and social theory. It is argued that world regions are the most suitable entry-point for comparing different socio-political constellations of our time, preferable to continents, civilizations and nation-states. However, a world regional foundation on its own is insufficient, due to the internal plurality and historically changing forms of world regions, and therefore needs to be accompanied by a concept that provides some degree of coherence within world regions and a tool for comparison with other world regions. The notion of modernity offers this level of generality while at the same time allowing for variety in its historical forms. Six main formations of modernity are identified, of which the European model was the first one and often a cultural reference for many other parts of the world. The thesis is that in the present day the most important developments are in the Asian and Latin American varieties, which unlike Europe are witnessing major historical transformation. Decisive in all of this is the question of democratization in the shaping of social imaginaries. Beginning with the problem of how to define the specificity of Europe, the paper provides an exploratory analysis of some of the salient considerations around a number of world regions, their formations of modernity, and the extent of major historical transformations in their present constitution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]