This chapter provides a review of the comparative literature on the politics of education with a focus on the politics of comprehensive school reforms. It summarizes the development of school systems in Norway and Germany during the postwar period of educational expansion. It then lays out the theoretical framework of the book. To this end, it introduces power resources theory and Rokkanian cleavage theory and discusses reflections on and expectations for education politics based on these perspectives. The chapter then summarizes the main argument and structure of the book. It ends with a note on the book’s history and a reflection on case selection and methodology.

In this concluding chapter, the contribution of the book is summarized: On the one hand, the comparative-historical case studies develop historically specific arguments for why Norwegian and German school politics evolved the way they did. On the other hand, they demonstrate that the Rokkanian approach is a fruitful starting point for comparative research on education politics. A final summary of the case studies and arguments is followed by a discussion of the general conclusions that can be drawn from them for comparative welfare and education regime research. The chapter also discusses some open questions that would merit further research. Finally, the current school-political situation in Norway and North Rhine-Westphalia/Germany is analyzed briefly with a focus on how cleavages come to expression today and what this means for political coalition making.

This chapter presents the theoretical framework and research design of the book. Drawing on cleavage theory, we argue that the new fault lines around globalization can no longer be captured along the classic redistributional left-right axis. From debates in political philosophy, we infer a distinction between ‘cosmopolitans’, who advocate open borders, universal norms, and supranational authority, and ‘communitarians’, who defend border closure, cultural particularism and national sovereignty. We also distinguish two hybrid positions, which we label ‘liberal nationalism’ and ‘regionalism’. In terms of processes of social structuration underlying conflicts related to globalization, we distinguish three explanations: an economic one, centred around the differential materials costs and benefits for various collective actors; a cultural one, centred around access to transnational cultural capital and a political one that captures the differing degree to which actors have access to supranational forums of decision-making. Finally, we introduce the book’s research design, the rationale behind the choice of countries and issues, and the main methods used to investigate them.