Partisan politics, economic coordination and the politics of education and training reform in Western Europe

This paper argues that the decades following WWII were a critical juncture in the institutional development of post-secondary education and training systems in Western European countries. The paper traces the historical development of education and training systems in Germany, Sweden and the UK with a particular focus on the actor constellations and politico-economic coalitions that promoted change. The application of process tracing to the concrete cases proceeds in several steps: First, the paper identifies a critical juncture in the institutional development of a particular policy field (education), based on the observation that countries started from relatively similar positions after WWII, but developed in very different ways thereafter. Second, the paper studies the political process leading up to the critical juncture, i.e. it identifies the relevant actors (partisan and labor market actors), their policy positions and the kind of politico-economic coalitions they form (formal and informal). Third, the analysis continues with the phase of path consolidation by observing how institutions and policies shape actors' preferences and strategies in the period after the critical juncture, thus affecting the balance of power as well as the agenda of later rounds of decision-making. The application of process tracing methods to concrete cases is based on theoretical expectations regarding the role of partisan politics and economic coordination, but the case studies also serve the purpose of theory-building by helping to refine hypotheses. 

More concretely, I argue that partisan politics played a crucial role: The dominance of social democrats and strong unions in Sweden led to the establishment of a comprehensive secondary education system, whereas the power of Christian democrats in Germany preserved the segmented, stratified system. In the UK, the Conservatives, in particular after Thatcher came to power, transformed the education system towards a market-based model. In addition to partisan politics, economic coordination influenced the options that policy-makers could choose from. When economic coordination was high (Sweden and Germany), both unions and employers ensured that vocational education and training remained a viable option in addition to academic higher education. In liberal market economies such the UK, attempts to maintain or resuscitate collective forms of apprenticeship training failed, thus academic drift was more pronounced. The question of whether and in which form vocational education and training "survived" this critical juncture of adjustment has deep implications for socio-economic inequality in the contemporary period.