Nodes and Nets in Educational Research Publishing: National Cases in International Contexts

• In Event: On Knowledge Organization of Educational Research: Comparative and International Mapping of Research Contributions and Publishing

Abstract

The current paper is based on the premises that knowledge organisation in educational research is a hybrid of agents and nets located in different contexts, as captured in research on higher education and research and in the formation of higher education institutions (Wagner & Wittrock, 1990). This hybridity is further emphasized in analyses of different fields in academia (Whitley, 2000), where education is characterized as an “adhocracy”, as a flexible and problem-focused organization with different addressees and stakeholder as well as financial resources (Author1). This leads to a contextual sensivity and uncertainty in research tasks, which is in need to be clarified in research communication and cooperation (Luhmann & Behnke, 1994). This is the overarching purpose of this study.
The objectives are:
1. To identify research publishing and referencing tendencies in different national contexts with different cultural characteristics.
2. To analyse research publishing in these cases in order to capture national and international nodes and networks.
3. To compare knowledge organisation located in different national contexts.
We are here using a comparative case approach (Nóvoa & Yariv-Mashal 2014) based on a combination of discourse analyses and bibliometric studies of research publications. The selected cases are representing different research cultures (Author4) and education systems (Esping Andersen, 1990).
The cases are presented in separate sections presenting educational research publication and their international and national nodes and nets. The reviews (Gough & Oliver, 2015) are not producing performative rankings but mapping research fields (Persson, 1994), and the cases are presented by researchers familiar with their respective contexts as well as with international research communication:
Case A: From academic guilds to professional experts? - German educational research between fragmentation and differentiation.
Case B: From integrated disciplinary structures to structures of governance through bibliometrics? Italian educational research under administrative siege
Case C: Globalization and fragmentation in educational research communication in a restructuring Swedish welfare state.
Case D: Insulated from the World as Part of (and Needing) the World: American Research on Education
Based on these cases we compare tendencies in educational research publishing and communication over time and place and in relation to internal and external control in the making and publishing of educational research, and implications of ongoing tendencies for international research cooperation. Given this, we discuss qualities in research organisation and competences at work in educational research. Our research contributes with significant knowledge to the field of educational research with international and contextualized analyses of educational research publishing in tandem in different societies.

Authors

• Edwin Keiner, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main

• Barbara Gross, Chemnitz University of Technology

• Sverker S:son Lindblad, University of Gothenburg

• Daniel Petterson, University of Gävle

• Katarina Samuelsson, Gothenburg University

• Thomas S. Popkewitz, University of Wisconsin - Madison