2024 Articles

Comparing two transfer spaces over time and against a global script: the case of school-autonomy-with-accountability

Steiner-Khamsi, Gita; Appius, Stephanie; Naegeli, Amanda

The study compares the selective adoption of the global school-autonomy-with-accountability (SAWA) reform in two cantons of Switzerland (Zurich and St. Gallen) over the period 1995–2015. The authors dissect the SAWA reform into three aspects: its theory of change, its bundle of policies, and its preferred policy instru- ments to achieve and sustain change. Methodologically, the study draws on a database of over 1,200 policy-relevant documents and expert interviews related to the so-called ‘outcomes-oriented school reform’ (German: wirkungsorientierte Schulreform) or SAWA, respectively. In an endeavor to advance research on policy borrow- ing, the authors propose a distinction between six temporal fea- tures of policy transfer: time, timing, tempo, lifespan, age, and sequence. They find that SAWA’s neoliberal theory of change was not adopted. However, select policies and instruments were trans- ferred and translated into the Swiss context. Furthermore, some policies expanded over time (standardized testing), some were dropped after a while (performance pay), some were kept on the books but, with age, hollowed out over time (external evaluation), and some were long-lived and were institutionalized (professional school management).

Keywords: comparative policy studies, comparative education, school reform, school autonomy with accountability, temporal dimension, education policy studies