Comparative and International Education

The Comparative and International Education Research Group brings together scholars working on education in comparative, international, and transnational perspective. Convened within the Department of Education at the University of Oxford, the group provides an intellectual home for academic staff, postdoctoral researchers, and doctoral students whose work engages with education systems, policies, and practices across diverse global contexts.

Since its inception in the 1990s, the group has contributed to research and public dialogue on educational transformation in low- and middle-income countries, as well as on the changing nature of education systems globally. Its work spans questions of inequality, governance, mobility, knowledge production, and social change, examined through historically informed, theoretically grounded, and empirically rich research.

Research within the group engages with education across Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East, and the Western Hemisphere. Rather than organising work around fixed regional silos, the group foregrounds comparison, relational analysis, and transnational processes, including the circulation of people, policies, ideas, and institutional models.

Key areas of substantive focus include:

• education and international development
• comparative and international higher education
• education governance, policy, and reform
• inequality, exclusion, and educational access
• international student mobility and its societal implications
• displacement, identity, and belonging
• gender, family, and community in education
• teacher education and professional learning
• skills, employability, and vocational education

The group is characterised by strong sociological and interdisciplinary foundations. Its work draws on social theory, political economy, anthropology, history, and philosophy to interrogate how education is shaped by power, structure, and agency. Critical approaches are central, including postcolonial, decolonial, and indigenous perspectives; anti-racist and reparative frameworks; and sustained attention to ethics, epistemic justice, and moral questions in education. Research also addresses education in contexts of conflict, reconstruction, displacement, and climate crisis.

Research conducted within the group is methodologically plural and intellectually ambitious. Members employ qualitative, quantitative, and mixed-methods designs, including interviews, ethnography,  policy and discourse analysis, historical and archival research, surveys, longitudinal studies, systematic reviews, bibliometric analysis, and social network analysis. Participatory, narrative, and creative methods are also used where appropriate, reflecting a commitment to methodological fit and epistemic reflexivity.

The group works collaboratively with scholars across Oxford, the UK, and internationally, and engages with a wide range of policy, civil society, and multilateral organisations concerned with education and social change. Research is supported by a diverse portfolio of national and international funders, enabling sustained engagement with interdisciplinary perspectives and real-world educational challenges.

Members of the group are actively involved in professional associations, editorial work, and scholarly leadership in the field of comparative and international education, contributing to academic journals, research networks, and public debate.

The Comparative and International Education Research Group is convened by Maia Chankseliani, Professor of Comparative and International Education.

Global Public Seminars in Comparative and International Education address themes of major interest to academics, practitioners, and policy-makers working in the field of education globally.

These seminars illuminate the role of education in societal development, with a focus on understanding changes in education policy, discourse, and practice, and how these changes influence individual opportunities and shape the development of educational institutions around the world. Seminars zoom into the local and zoom out into the national and supranational spaces, flows, and influences on education.

Past Seminars

The recordings of past Global Public Seminars in Comparative and International Education can be accessed by following these links:

Stretching spatial theories: New ways of thinking of space and time in comparative and international education, Marianne Larsen, Professor Emerita, Western University, Canada

Technologies of Agency: Student Mobility in Era of Digital Internationalization, Chris Glass, Professor of the Practice, Boston College, USA

Action Plan for an Inclusive Education Policy for the State of Qatar, Asmaa Al-Fadala, Assistant Professor, Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Qatar

One size fits all? The role of Hong Kong universities in the emerging Greater Bay Area, Tatiana Fumasolli, Professor of Higher Education Studies, UCL, UK

Learning equity: Some limitations of SDG4, and the potential of marginalization policies, Daniel A. Wagner, Professor and UNESCO Chair, University of Pennsylvania, USA

An international survey study exploring teachers’ perceptions on using mathematical storytelling: The case of England, Dr Natthapoj Vincent Trakulphadetkrai-Techavijit, University of Reading, UK

Using, misusing, and abusing education research journals, Professor Gustavo Fischman, Arizona State University, USA

Internationalizing Education Research: Bridging National and Global Perspectives in Japan’s Education and Comparative Education Research, Professor Akiyoshi Yonezawa, Tohoku University, Japan

‘Society is fragmenting!’: discourses of migration and education in the press in France and England, Professor Oakleigh Welply, Durham University, UK

Perception of uncertainty by the participants of the educational process under state of war in higher education institutions of Ukraine, Professor Oksana Bodnar, Ternopil Volodymyr Hnatiuk National Pedagogical University, Ukraine

Higher education in Ukraine at a time of war: state of the network, legislative support, educational process organisation peculiarities, Professor Olena Lokshyna, Dr. Sc., Institute of Pedagogy of the National Academy of Educational Sciences of Ukraine, Borys Grinchenko Kyiv University, Ukraine

Adapting the University (of Lviv) in time of war, Professor Roman Gladyshevskii, Dr. Sc., Academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Vice-Rector for Research, Ivan Franko National University of Lviv, Ukraine

Internationalisation as one of the key components of Ukrainian university activities in times of Russia’s military invasion, Dr Yuliya Zayachuk, Academic visitor at the Department of Education, University of Oxford, UK, and Associate Professor, Ivan Franko National University of Lviv, Ukraine

Giving epistemic due to the educational experiences of young women with disabilities in Palestine, Dr Alison Mackenzie and Dr Mohammed Owaineh, Queen’s University Belfast, UK

New Kids on the Block: Features, Trends, and Regulation of For-profits in Higher Education Worldwide Speaker: Dr Dante Salto, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, USA

Revisiting Social Reproduction Theory: An empirical study based on the data of PISA 2018 Speaker: Yan Luo, Tsinghua University, China

From Perpetrator to Peacebuilder: Rethinking Education in Conflict-Affected Societies Speaker: Professor Tejendra Pherali, UCL, UK

Understanding Dynamic Influences of Educational Reform in Ethiopia Speaker: Professor Ricardo Sabates Aysa, University of Cambridge, UK

Rurality in Globalised Higher Education: Comparative Perspectives from International Doctoral Research Theses Speaker: Professor Catherine Montgomery, Faculty of Social Sciences and Health, Durham University, UK

Re-imagining Intellectual Leadership in Post-Soviet Higher Education Speaker: Professor Anatoly Oleksiyenko, Department of International Education, the Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK), Hong Kong

Toppling Statues? Complicity, Whiteness and Reckoning in Comparative and International Education Speakers: Professors Robin Shields & Julia Paulson, University of Bristol, UK

Why does educational tracking lead to greater inequality in political engagement? Zooming in on France Speaker: Professor Germ Janmaat, UCL Institute of Education, UK

Education in Emergencies & the Implicated Subject: Imperial Pasts and Presents Speaker: Professor Mario Novelli, Professor in the Political Economy of Education, Centre for International Education, University of Sussex, UK

Tiger parenting under globalization: Social class, ethnicity and culture Speaker: Dr Nutsa Kobakhidze, Assistant Professor in Comparative and International Education, Faculty of Education, the University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong

Overview of Education In Africa: How the Implementation of the CESA And SDG4 Agendas is Progressing? Speaker: Dr Carolina Alban Conto, Research and Development Manager, IIEP – UNESCO Africa Office, Dakar, Senegal

At The Crossroads: Rethinking the Role of Education in Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism Speaker: Thomas Koruth Samuel, Consultant, Terrorism Prevention, Southeast Asia and the Pacific, Regional Centre for East Asia and the Pacific, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC)

Social Distance, Teachers’ Beliefs and Teaching Practices in a Context of Social Disadvantage: Evidence from India and Pakistan   Speaker: Dr Rabea Malik, CEO and Fellow, Institute of Development and Economic Alternatives; Assistant Professor, School of Education, LUMS, Pakistan

‘Breaking gender, sex and sexuality borders: The case of comprehensive sexuality education in South Africa’ Speaker: Thabo Msibi, Dean and Head of School, School of Education, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

‘Global Middle-Class families – comparative study of travel trajectories and imagined futures’ Speaker: Miri Yemini, Senior Lecturer, Tel Aviv University, Israel

‘Equal’ Transnational Partnerships in Higher Education: Sino-Foreign Case Studies’ Speaker: Miguel Antonio Lim, Senior Lecturer in Education, University of Manchester, UK

‘Why did policymakers in India and Mexico adopt the Germanic model of dual apprenticeships?’ Speaker: Oscar Valiente, Senior Lecturer University of Glasgow, UK

‘Governing education by partnership: the GPE in the context of other sectors’ global financing partnerships.’ Speaker: Moira V. Faul, Executive Director, NORRAG, Graduate Institute for International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland

‘A comparison of the transition of returning scholars to domestic research environments in Kazakhstan, Malaysia and Cambodia.’ Speaker: Aliya Kuzhabekova, Associate Professor, Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan

‘Methods and Findings from OECD’s Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) Video Study of Teaching’ Speaker: V. Darleen Opfer, Vice President, RAND Education and Labor Research Division; Distinguished Chair in Education Policy, USA

Renegotiating the Public Good: Education Policy Responses to Covid-19 in England, Germany and Italy Speaker: Dr Peter Kelly, Reader in Comparative Education, University of Plymouth, UK

The Divided World of Comparative Research on Pedagogy Speaker: Michele Schweisfurth, Professor of Comparative and International Education, School of Education, University of Glasgow, UK