A3 Refereed book chapter or chapter in a compilation book
Studying convergences in comparative education
Authors: Jokila, Suvi; Eta, Elizabeth Agbor
Editors: Wiseman, Alexander W.; Anderson, Emily W.; Damaschke-Deitrick, Lisa; Galegher, Ericka; Dzotsenidze, Nino; Park, Maureen
Publication year: 2025
Book title : Handbook on Comparative Education
Series title: Elgar Handbooks in Education
First page : 101
Last page: 109
ISBN: 978-1-80392-782-4
eISBN: 978-1-80392-783-1
DOI: https://doi.org/10.4337/9781803927831.00019
Web address : https://doi.org/10.4337/9781803927831.00019
This chapter discusses conceptual understanding in the analysis of convergence in comparative education research. In recent decades, comparative education as a field of study has been criticized for focusing on the nation-state as the unit of analysis. In response, more attention is being paid to how things ‘come together’. This chapter builds on an overview and examines the conceptualizations of ‘convergence’ as a process of becoming similar, and the related processes. It is not always clear what comparativists mean when they refer to convergence, what is converging and what causes it. In this chapter, we ask how the field of comparative education has conceptualized and theorized convergence. Producing this kind of conceptual understanding enables a more in-depth understanding of the meta-level conceptual discussion in the field of comparative education.