Comparative and International Education: An Introduction

This book introduces comparative and international education (CIE) to new students of the field. Comparative and International Education surveys a spectrum of theories, methods, and practices for the benefit of both novice scholars and seasoned practitioners. It resourcefully explores comparative education’s successive historical phases, from its institutional heyday as “development education” in the 1960s to its emerging contemporary directions. A global field of unprecedented geopolitical extent across shifting spaces, comparative education is too complex to be captured by old dichotomies of development vs. underdevelopment. This book assembles a rich picture of the field’s many ways of knowing, scrutinizing education’s role in societies, and comparisons among national learning outcomes. It examines contemporary reconfigurations, including education for sustainable development and our interdependent futures, and rethinks the spatial dimensions and the vocabularies we use in studying, researching, and comparing education internationally. We hope to open avenues for the teaching and study of education in its local and geopolitical context. Research topics are illustrated by case-studies from scholars in the field. This volume will help you discover how comparative and international education (CIE) in the 21st century is practiced and where it is heading.