A Methodological Approach to Global Education Policy Research. Studying International Education Hubs Comparatively

• In Event: Dissertation workshop session
  In Special Session: Global Engagement

Proposal

International Education Hubs (IEHs) refer to themselves as regional magnets of talent and academic excellence. As a social phenomenon, they are a contemporary issue in international comparative (higher) education as well as education policy-research. However, despite some programmatic and affirmative work on the topic, driven by grey literature and diverse policies/strategy-papers, research on the implications of IEHs for higher education policy and governance is rare, and it is unfortunate that empirical evidence is little (cf. Lane, & Kinser, 2011; Knight, 2014). Nevertheless, the implications of IEHs – governmental projects aiming at transforming selected territories into economically competitive and socially progressive areas by means of reforming education, in particular higher education – might be quite severe: By embedding higher education policy in major political projects, IEHs are thought to contribute to innovative entrepreneurialism, economic competitiveness, and social progressiveness in their host regions (such as Qatar, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Botswana, Bahrain, and so forth). In these cases, states collaborate with, for instance, transnational research universities and knowledge-intensive industries. Viewed as a somewhat ‘imaginary gesture’, states aim to extend their opportunity structures throughout a global network to connect powerfully the networks’ strands within their territory as a hub, constituting the state as a regional (or global) magnet of talent, academic excellence, and high-skilled labor. For instance, these more and more common approaches to contemporary large-scale/whole-system higher education reform may indicate a changing role of the state, the study of which commands attention to diverse dynamics predominantly investigated in contemporary Global Education Policy (GEP) research (cf. Mundy, Green, Lingard, & Verger, 2016; or Verger, Lubienski, & Steiner-Khamsi, 2016).

Against this backdrop, this contribution to the New Scholars Dissertation Mentoring Workshop discusses a methodological approach for comparatively researching the implications of IEHs for higher education policy and governance in the context of my ongoing qualitative international comparative doctoral study. This doctoral study has two overall objectives (with related research questions), which inquire first into the analytical potential of the concept of IEHs for international and comparative education research (and development), and, second, into the complex implications of IEHs as educational reform strategies on higher education policy and governance, which is studied empirically between Singapore and the United Arab Emirates as two prominent hub locations. The methodological approach – which will be one aspect of my dissertation I would like to discuss in the workshop – builds on Bartlett & Vavrus’s (2017) Comparative Case Study approach to study GEP-research between global construction(s) and local implementation(s) throughout scale, time, and space. While the research object is theoretically conceptualized based on Cultural Political Economy and (Educational) Governance Research, this contribution presents an emerging international-comparative educational research design that methodologically seeks to account for the inherent complexity of GEP-research. Based on a discursive research approach (cf. Fairclough 1992; Wodak & Fairclough, 1997; Wodak 2004; Jungmann & Besio, 2018), first findings suggest the formation of intricate relations throughout scale, time, and space that constitute global discursive spaces, yet local implementations. Those preliminary findings are based on first documents analyzed, which – regarding empirical data gathered – are complemented with interviews conducted on site. Interviews in the UAE have been conducted in September 2018, and will be conducted in Singapore in November 2018, so that this contribution will directly be based on the data gathered during these weeks of submitting this proposal to CIES. Hence, the described project is in between the data collection, data analysis, and beginning of writing stage(s), opening up a broad spectrum of possibilities to contribute to the dissertation workshop.
With regard to contributing to international comparative education research more generally, investigating IEHs may open up new vistas for exploring changing relationships of higher education to society, state, and the (knowledge-based) economy that may generate far-reaching consequences, with profound implications – not only for higher education policy and governance, but for conceptions of education and higher education in general. Discussions in the workshop could focus on (theoretical-)methodological considerations concerning the construction/design of the study’s methodology in the context of GEP-research.

Doctoral Advisors: Marcelo Parreira do Amaral, U Münster, Germany & Stephen Carney, U Roskilde, Denmark

Author

• Marvin Erfurth, University of Muenster, Germany