Analyzing (and comparing) policy mobilities in federal education systems
Potentials of a topological lens
Publication date
2023-06-13
Document type
Forschungsartikel
Author
Urbas, Christopher
Organisational unit
Publisher
Arizona State University
Series or journal
Education Policy Analysis Archives
ISSN
Periodical volume
31
Periodical issue
71
First page
1
Last page
21
Peer-reviewed
✅
Part of the university bibliography
✅
Language
English
Keyword
Topology
Policy analysis
Digitization
Federal systems
Germany
COVID-19
Abstract
This contribution takes up and discusses topology as a relational approach to better understand and empirically trace policy mobilities in federal education systems. While topology echoes other relational approaches in its simultaneous focus on ongoing change and the “making” of stabilized forms (e.g., policy scales), it also brings attention to facets of policy mobility research that other approaches have, at least so far, considered to a much lesser extent. Such facets include the systematic integration of a temporal dimension (e.g., rhythms of scale- or policy-making) as well as the consideration of digital/data space-times. Equally, topology reminds us that policy itself is increasingly becoming topological—that is to say, policy-making is increasingly ruled by movement spaces, logics of connectedness, and capacities for change, instead of formal authority, position, or transmission. Integrating these different dimensions into a heuristic framework, we illuminate what we see differently when applying a topological lens to policy mobility analysis in federal education systems, using the example of German education policies since the 2000s, particularly transformations induced by the ongoing pandemic, as a case study.
Description
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/.
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Published version
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