Social studies in the Nordic countries – stability and change

University of Bergen, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, and Norwegian University for Technology and Science invite to a Nordic conference in social studies didactics in Bergen, April 11-13 2018.

The Nordic countries are among top 10 of best and happiest countries to live in. They are characterized by a relative high levels of political and social trust and comparatively well working democracies, respect for human rights, fairly good educational systems and good healthcare. Despite this overall good picture the countries also face important challenges. The Nordic countries all face the global challenges of climate, poverty, regional conflicts, refugee crises and political tensions. Immigration has for decades been a contested political issue which creates serious political tensions in school, between groups of people and between political parties. It has led to increased ghettoization of cities and marginalized citizens. High dropout rates marginalize a growing number of young people and challenges inclusiveness and equality in education. New public management (NPM) changes the public sector and citizens are given new individualized roles as 'users and clients'. Both gender and family pluralizes, thus creating quests for new group rights and social integration. The economic structure changes; urbanization, global competition and labour market changes all are important elements in this respect. And finally, the international context is changing regarding security policies as well as concerning transnational governance in general.

Faced with stability and change, important questions are how social studies in the Nordic countries respond to this, and how it ought to respond Who should decide what these responses should be? And should social studies only respond and reflect or also take a normative position to these major issues? How are student conditions and pre-dispositions for learning about society changing? The conference welcomes contributions across this broad field of challenges, both concerning how social studies change and what it ought to be.

Abstract

Registration deadline: March 1st

Abstracts must be submitted by October 15 2017 to noksa@hvl.no.

For papers that are sent to the organizing committee by March 20 2018, there will be prepared opponents.

The final program will be based on incoming abstracts. 

Key Note Speakers

Reinholdt Hedtke and Trond Solhaug will give plenary lectures.

Reinhold Hedtke is professor in sociology at the University of Bielefeld. Hedtke has his research interests in economic/socio-economic education, participatory citizenship education and European cultures of citizenship education. Hedtke will concentrate his plenary presentation around resent international research and theoretical developments in the social studies didactics.

Trond Solhaug is a political scientist and professor in social science didactics and pedagogy at NTNU. Solhaug’s research interests are democracy, citizenship in education as well as teacher education,  'inclusive citizenship' and focus on participation, political identity and intercultural competence as well as integration in teacher education.