The issue of the presumed "identity" of Comparative Education as a field of study or a discipline has been discussed for decades. Yet what remains open to question is a kind of systematic structure that provides the basic principles for a coherent exposition of the field. After conceptualising and rejecting almost a dozen possible…

Wicherts, Dolan, and van der Maas (2009) contend that the average IQ of sub-Saharan Africans is about 80. A critical evaluation of the studies presented by WDM shows that many of these are based on unrepresentative elite samples. We show that studies of 29 acceptably representative samples on tests other than the Progressive Matrices give a…

In this article the author discusses public reaction generated by the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings. He argues that it is not simply that the methodologies adopted by the main rankers -- Times Higher Education (THE), QS and the Shanghai Jiao Tong University -- are diverse and open to the usual interpretation, but there…

Social scientists have long worked to replicate real-world phenomena in their research and teaching environments. Unlike our biophysical science colleagues, we are faced with an area of study that is not governed by the laws of physics and other more predictable relationships. As a result, social scientists, and international studies scholars more…

Does rhetoric have a place in the discourse of human rights? Without certain reply, as the dilemmas of defining, claiming, and promoting human rights appear both to include and exclude the rhetorical gesture, this question invites inquiry into the preface of the contemporary human rights regime, the moment of the aftermath that provokes a struggle…

This paper addresses the fact that although globalization cannot be resisted by the nation-state, it is often confronted by mixed reactions from both the GN (Global North) and the GS (Global South). The essay charges that globalization has political, economic and cultural impact on the nation-state, which ultimately impacts the issue of identity…

In their reactions to my paper, the four authors provide comments that are illuminating and helpful for continuing discussions of the nature and utility of quantitative, comparative, international studies of educational achievement. In this response, I comment further on the issues of test characteristics, sample design, culture and causation.

Since the late 1990s there has been a fundamental shift in the way schooling and even education as a whole is evaluated. From this new perspective the education system would seem to be interpreted as a sub-system of the economic system and thus subservient to it. Decisions on education matters seem to have become determinant for individual…

This article responds to Shelby Gilbert's "A Study of Ogbu and Simon's Thesis." The author begins by saying that he thinks that this study of examining Ogbu and Simons' thesis (to investigate school performance of Black immigrant and non-immigrant students in the United States) makes a thought-provoking contribution to overall discussions…

Looking back fifty years is a salutary experience. There is a sense that everything changes, and everything stays the same. Whilst people now have a global non-government organisation to support national bodies in the field of adult learning, most of the national members have a fragile financial base, and the International Council for Adult…

This article presents a collection of work that grew out of an international symposium sponsored by the History of Education Society UK and held in Hamburg in 2007. The symposium aimed to contribute to understandings of different approaches to researching the extent to which education has contributed historically to social change in respect of…

Twenty years ago, the Council on International Educational Exchange (CIEE) convened a group of experts to examine international higher education and make recommendations for the future of study abroad programs at U.S. universities. In its report to CIEE, the group--which represented a wide range of experience in higher education, foreign language…

This volume offers a close look at four cases of indigenous language revitalization: Maori in Aotearoa/New Zealand, Sami in Scandinavia, Hnahno in Mexico and Quechua and other indigenous languages in Latin America. Essays by experts from each case are in turn discussed in international perspective by four counterpart experts. This book is divided…

In a rapidly globalizing world, it is becoming a major task of international education to study a variety of sociopolitical, economic, developmental, and intercultural relations, at the heart of which lie issues around subalternity, diversity, language, and dialogue. In its current state, how well prepared is the field of international education…

This forum reconstructs a roundtable discussion about the academic responsibilities of International Relations professors with respect to their undergraduate students. Specifically, participants discuss the proper pedagogical role of professors' personal political beliefs and the best ways to encourage undergraduate students to engage political…