The study examined how legislators, central bureaucrats, and teachers interpret the Swedish School Act's formulation that education should be based on science. A special focus was on education about values. The study was conducted using informant interviews with representatives of the political, central bureaucratic, and teacher level. The results…

The politicization of history education relating to colonialism in former major colonial powers, like Britain and France, and former colonies has for obvious reasons received ample scholarly attention. But how is colonial history represented in educational materials aimed at primary school students in countries with a less evident connection to…

Introduction: Current literature recognizes that various socialization agents often shape political behavior. This study employs frameworks of political socialization and political agency to explore how extracurricular activities and political intentions established at age 16 influence aspects of political participation and civic engagement at age…

This article underscores the importance of contextualization when analysing values education. The interplay between societal values and those imparted within an educational context significantly affect the interpretation and comprehension of values education. To address this concern, I strategically position sociologist Tiffany Mary Jones…

This article interprets how five left-leaning parties in Sweden and Spain intend to politically socialise their members through the use of educational activities. By applying a framing perspective on interviews with leading party representatives from the five parties, the analysis theoretically illuminates how educational activities can be a tool…

In this paper, we engage with five Swedish universities' discursive articulation of, and responses to, an alleged post-truth crisis in communication, aimed at the public. Taking discourse theory as our point of departure, the aim is to analyse how universities are trying to maintain or restore trustworthiness against a backdrop of problems with…

Significant collaborations with research partners in China are seen in many Western countries. With increasing US-China geopolitical tensions, governments, research institutions, and individuals in established scientific systems are increasingly required to address a proliferating array of risks and challenges associated with collaboration with…

In the 1960s, people across the West started imagining that they were in a societal transition. Crucially, in these future-oriented discussions, social class was often transformed into educational attainment as the main dividing line. These future studies garnered attention across the political spectrum, including the Swedish Conservative Party.…

Democratic school climate, critical reflection, and student participation at school have been linked to the development of civic and political attitudes. The study aims to identify the contribution of these characteristics to the development of civic and political attitudes and their impact on students' participation (civic, political, activist,…

Previous research has identified political ideology as central in the landmark Academies Act (2010). This article further analyses how politics of evidence played its part in the policy process by focusing on long-term structural changes and preferences among policymakers. The article draws on policymaker interviews after the reform, a mapping of…

Conflicts between young immigrants and older native populations are widely recognized as a challenge in different parts of the world. In the European context, the following paper focuses on presenting the research results of a community-based project entitled "ICT Guides" conducted in Gothenburg (Sweden), Sheffield (the United Kingdom),…

This article seeks to introduce a new historical explanation as to why left-wing working-class women engaged in liberal, middle-class organisations during the first wave of feminism. The article specifically deals with middle-class associations and clubs that had educational purposes. Instead of focusing on the larger explanatory scheme of the…

This study analyses how "active democratic participation" is conceptualised by sixteen teacher educators from eight institutions of higher education across four Nordic countries and how these conceptualisations are translated into their own teaching. Teacher educators' strong adherence to a liberal discourse on democratic education may…

Based on arguments about the need for greater individual freedom, school choice was introduced in Sweden in the 1990s. Swedish municipalities now set up local school choice systems, whose organization varies between municipalities. This study is based on interviews with three politicians and two civil servants from two average-sized municipalities…

This study examines whether youth's goals for their future societal engagement affect their future political activities. We hypothesized, first, that youth's political interest would be a central predictor of their future political activities and, second, that their goals for future societal engagement would moderate their political interest. The…