How education standards gain hegemonic power and become international: The case of higher education and the Bologna Process

Abstract

Through an ethnographic exploration of policy documents, this paper aims to expose how outcome-oriented education standards gained international hegemonic status in the Bologna Process. Taking inspiration in the concept of hegemony and by connecting the invisible power of hegemony to soft governance, the paper shows how the outcome-based modular curriculum gained hegemonic power by means of the infrastructure of the reform. Centring on the movement from political agendas within the Bologna Process to the implementation in a national context using Denmark as a case, the paper tracks the transformation from an input- and content-driven curriculum to an outcome- and objectives-driven curriculum and the transition from a semestrial timeframe structure to a modular block structure. The paper shows how consent and legitimisation is manufactured through the infrastructure of the Bologna Process consisting of communication paths, standardisation and follow-up mechanisms such as benchmarking through graphs and frameworks for reporting.