This article traces the shifting profile of the elementary school teaching profession in Finland over 130 years in relation to changes in the model of citizenship, acknowledging the role of the Scandinavian welfare state. Mass education has assigned teachers a crucial role in the initiation into adulthood. (SLD)

Interrogates the prevailing concept of the state as a regulative idea. Introduces Michel Foucault's notion of "governmentality" and investigates how it has historically been linked to education and to the Scandinavian "Caring State." Explores changing tasks of education and the nature of social contracts that could correspond…