The Nordic countries are often perceived as a coherent group representing the Nordic model of welfare states, with a strong emphasis on the public provision of universal welfare and a strong concern with social equality. But today we see a change in the Nordic model as part of a global knowledge economy. The aim of this article is to examine education in the five Nordic countries utilising three dimensions of political change: deregulation, marketisation and privatisation. We also analyse the parallel changes in relation to segregation and differentiation in education. The analysis shows that the themes related to deregulation seem to show fairly similar patterns and structures in all contexts. The emerging differences were discovered mainly in the themes of marketisation and privatisation. Institutional segregation emerges in all Nordic countries to different extents along the lines of these three processes, and we observe a simultaneous social segregation and differentiation with an ambiguous connection to them. Based on these findings, the question of what is left of the "Nordic model" could be raised.

Over recent decades we have witnessed a growing emphasis on educational quality assurance and evaluation (QAE) around the globe. The trend, not only to intensify evaluative measurements, but also to publish school-specific indicators, has become visible also in the Nordic countries. In Sweden, Denmark and Norway, the governments have launched webportals, in which various indicators can be observed and compared at the school level. However in Finland, the data is published only at a general level.In this article we compare the discourses of educational experts on comprehensive school QAE policies and practices in four Nordic countries, Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland. Our aim is to clarify how the discursive practices reflect the current evaluation and publication policies and how the discourses construct the rationales of educational governance. We have approached our data (58 interviews) from the framework of discursive institutionalism, which sees both the underlying ideas and beliefs, and the discursive practices as the dynamic factors behind institutional change.We argue, that in all the Nordic countries these discursive practices take place in a balancing discursive triad between global competence, neo-liberal accountability pressures and the traditions of the egalitarian Nordic comprehensive school-however with varying country-specific rationales on school accountability and transparency.

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This paper discusses the relationship between knowledge and society in social studies by analysing how society is presented in four Finnish social studies textbooks currently in use in comprehensive education. Besides its empirical contribution, the paper examines the possibilities of applying Michael Young's understanding of powerful knowledge in social studies by complementing it with two additional theoretical approaches to society. Firstly, by applying Basil Bernstein's concept of recontextualisation, it is possible to elaborate on the way in which social studies textbooks reproduce societal power relations. Secondly, by observing the society of social studies textbooks in the light of Niklas Luhmann´s social systems theory, it is possible to examine how social reproduction in social studies is related to temporal forms of knowledge in a functionally differentiated, multifaceted society. The findings indicate that due to the present-focused and institutional approach to society, the textbooks offer few tools for critical understanding and for changing society.

The future is rarely problematised in education even though it is self-evident in everyday schoolwork and present also in the management of education. However, we should understand how different future visions influence our understanding of education. In this paper, we apply rhetorical analysis and study how the future of education is rhetorically constructed in Finnish policy texts. Also, we analyze the special characteristic of Finnish future visions, which are based on the idea of Finnish education being top-notch. We focus explicitly on the idea of knowledge and its future relations in school education. In our data, the current school is rhetorically contrasted with the future one. This hastens the need to modernize Finnish school system. This view is reinforced by the needs of the economy and working life. Pathos is frequently used as a rhetorical strategy. Finns are warned about remaining in the past and obliged to change their education immediately. Future visions of Finnish education seem to be limited only to positive aspects.