PISA lends legitimacy: A study of education policy changes in Germany and Sweden after 2000

Abstract

School issues have become increasingly important in public elections and political debates, leading to increased focus on the results students achieve in international large-scale assessments and in the rankings of the involved countries. One of the most important studies of scholastic performance is the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), which has gained a good deal of attention since the first study was published in 2000. This article analyses to what extent examples from international assessments and other countries’ results have been used as arguments for school policy change in Germany and Sweden. The conclusion is that both countries, after undergoing a “PISA shock”, found justification for changes in their education policy by referring to other countries. Their views of how to solve the problem (i.e., the drop in results) were also similar: increased management and control of parts of the education system, albeit by different means.