Thoughts on Methodology in Comparative and International Education

Copyright © 2006 by José Cossa

By nature, Comparativists engage in explanations of why educational systems and processes vary and how education relates to wider social factors and forces. The comparativists’ interest in explanations leads to the use of epistemologies in order to study issues and the comparativists’ preference of a particular epistemology over another lead to distinctions between the methodological schools of comparative education.

In academia, the common distinctions in methodology are the dichotomies of qualitative and quantitative under which fall all sorts of methods or research designs, i.e., historical analysis, content analysis, discourse analysis, phenomenological, hermeneutical, case study, statistical analysis, ethnographic, grounded theory, survey research, experimental studies, etc. While acknowledging the distinctions qualitative and quantitative, Comparative education adds distinctions based on mode of reasoning that are unique to its field; these distinctions cannot pin-pointedly be matched with qualitative and quantitative, i.e., nomothetic and ideographic. The tendency of equating ideographic with qualitative and nomothetic with quantitative is to be avoided because a study can be ideographic and use quantitative elements or nomothetic yet use qualitative elements. Therefore, while appropriate to use qualitative and quantitative, comparative education approach is better characterized as ideographic or nomothetic.

Nomothetic approach, initially associated with Marc-Antoine Jullien, is rooted in the Latin nomo, which means law or rule; while ideographic approach, initially associated with Sadler, is rooted in the Latin ideo, which means individual or particular unit.

Nomothetic approach isolates a few social factors to identify underlying trends and patterns and apply these trends and patterns to schooling in order to arrive at a general explanation of a class of educational actions or events. It depends on the idea that if phenomena are regular, then there is a possibility of prediction; and on the assumption that phenomena are related, or correlated, and influence one another. Here the researcher seeks to find a predicting stream of social phenomena through hypothesis testing or generating cross-national generalizations.

Ideographic approach analyzes the special social and cultural circumstances that differentiate schooling in one society from another. It seeks to yield deep understanding, or verstehen, of issues related to education through an acquisition of special insight deriving from intensive study of school-society relationships within particular contexts, thus hinges on socio-cultural expertise. Ideographic scholars, e.g., King, Sadler, Maseman, advocate that everything is relative to context, particularly to cultural context. This school is often addressed through the perspectives of relativism, phenomenology, postmodernism, and hermeneutics. An example of the ideographic perspective is seen in Sadler (1900) whose major discontent with nomothetic generalizations was embodied in the metaphor of a child strolling through a garden and picking off flowers from one bush and leaves from another with the futile hope of planting a tree from the gathered ingredients.

Nomothetic scholars, e.g., Arnold Anderson, Psacharopoulos, Patrinos, Philip Foster, Eckstein, Noah, etc., advocate that everything is related independent of context. For example, the studies of returns to investments in education by Psacharopoulos (e.g., Returns to Investment in Education: A Further Update) are strictly based on numeric indicators (e.g., statistical comparison of level of education between men and women) of various countries across the world and uniqueness of context is not a concern in describing why returns in education are higher in some countries and low in others nor why are they different within one country and between men and women in view of cultural considerations. I am reminded of an example found in Hanlon’s book entitled, Mozambique: Who Calls the Shots?, in which Hanlon describes a visit of the World Bank to Mozambique during the administration of Samora Machel (in the 80s). In the example he mentions that when he asked a WB representative whether the man was familiar with Mozambique and its current context, the man replied that he had no knowledge of Mozambique, but that his knowledge of other African countries was sufficient to help Mozambique solve its current problems because African problems followed a particular pattern therefore the solutions to one’s problems could apply to another.

Turner’s Models of Social Ascent Through Education: Sponsored and Contest Mobility in which he makes the generalization that the two ideal-typical normative patterns of upward mobility in his study can be readily applied to comparisons other than the United States and England. Usually, comparativists associated with this positivistic school are in the fields of economics and sociology (this is not to say that economists and comparativists are all nomothetic scholars because as with every rule there are exceptions). Another example is found in Sharpe’s The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Catholicism: Ideological and Institutional Constraints on System Change in English and French Primary Schooling. Sharpe studies primary schooling in France and England from two theoretical frameworks, which are the causal factors of the distinctions in the two systems. Without the understanding of the cultural phenomena one would not be able to clearly see the reasons for the distinctions between French and English education. However, Sharp used a nomothetic platform to advance his argument.

On the other hand, ideographic scholars, e.g., King, Saddler, Maseman, etc., advocate that everything is relative to context, particularly cultural context. This school comes close to relativism, phenomenology, postmodernism, hermeneutics, etc., and is predominantly characterized by comparativists working in fields related to history and anthropology and the like. An example of this is Kandel’s work (though labeled by Epstein as Eclectic), The Study of Comparative Education, in which he claims that educational systems cannot be transferred from one cultural environment to another, but ideas and principles can be studied, modified to suit new conditions. If an ideographic scholar, working in the WB, would study the same problems of Mozambique in the Machel administration and had to be asked the same question that Hanlon asked his interlocutor, the answer would have been a discourse of socio-cultural issues related to the change from colonialism to independent Mozambique through the civil war and the social problems it was causing even before mentioning other countries in Africa – and in all this dialogue the uniqueness of the Mozambican context and its contrast with other countries in Africa would have been either mentioned or inferred.

Ultimately, I am of the opinion that when combined, both approaches generate a formidable study. When we manage to back up our socio-cultural versthen with hypothesis testing (not necessarily testing a complex relationship between independent and dependent variables), our findings not only become less susceptible to criticism by one camp or another, but they become enhanced with a cross-field appreciation and respect.

Stream of Consciousness About Life

My Stream of Consciousness on Life

2003 © José A. Cossa

The questions of existence and meaning have tortured humans for many centuries; whether I am deceived about my own existence or if I am right that I exist, is not the ultimate issue to me. There are two kinds of existence and there are multitudes of meaning to life. The awareness of one’s existence is independent of one’s awareness of meaning. For example, if we ask a child what is the meaning of his or her life, we are likely to come empty-handed from such inquiry; however, if we ask adolescents and adults, it is likely that we will come out of that inquiry with a multitude of responses. The fact that the child may not give a dissertation on the meaning of life does not mean that the child is not aware of his or her existence, but that he or she has not constructed a (or even inherited a constructed) meaning to his or her existence.

As stated earlier, whether I actually exist or not is not the ultimate issue to me. There are two realms to existence and meaning: The metaphysical and the physical. That which cannot be perceived by the naked eye and human faculties, and that which can; however, one should not be naïve and ignore that even the existence (if we can so say) of the metaphysical has been constructed to us by others through human faculties. In other words, we have created perceptions of reality or realities with our own human faculties, and this very fact limits us from achieving an ultimate agreement and grasp the essence of what is, i.e., its existence and meaning.

In my childhood I was more inquisitive and suspicious of constructs than I am today; or, perhaps I am returning to my childhood inquiries. I remember arguing for nothing as no-existence, no-reality, and no-thing in order to be the one to play first in games that required turns and in which to be first to play placed one in an advantageous position. I argued that nothing presupposed the non-existence of God and of zero; however, my friends’ growing awareness of the power of the concept-tool nothing led me to develop another dimension beyond non-existence and I became an advocate of before-nothing. In my thesis the concept nothing is an emptiness that can be perceived while before-nothing presupposes no-perception, even of non-existence. Before-nothing is not the same as a vacuum or emptiness because these two constructs presuppose containment within a particular frame or boundaries even if that frame or boundaries cannot be perceived.

As I reflect about the concept of God, I agree with my early childhood attribution of its inadequacy to define what humans have attempted to deem as the cause of all causes and of existence itself. God, in any language and under any name, is a human construct that attempts to claim an understanding of that which caused existence, but whatever caused existence and is often perceived or defined as self-causing is inadequate to explain a stage prior to existence; therefore, in order to explain such a stage, it is imperative that one understands human intellectual finitude that constraints us from fathoming mysteries that pertain a prior-to-existence stage. One could attempt to define that which caused all things by means of an incognita such as x, y, z, etc.; but that is begging the question because an incognita requires a definition and an explanation of origination since it is a human construct.

So, what could depict that mystery beyond existence and nothing? I find actual silence as the best way to engage in the mystery characterized as before-nothing. For in silence there are no constructs and there is no thought (in this case, I mean silence as the absence of noise of any kind including thought). Whether this is possible for any human at any given time is a mystery itself. If we can strip ourselves from every construct and utterance, we might be close to identifying ourselves with the before-nothing mystery and thus appreciate existence in a new light. We will learn to appreciate constructs of existence (as they may emerge) in light of the before-nothing and not those constructed for us by first-cause, causal, nihilistic or ex-nihilistic theorists. I am not suggesting some sort of transcendental meditation to empty oneself of all thought because I view such practice as an attempt to rid oneself of thoughts by substituting them with a thought of emptiness and not necessarily reaching emptiness of mind, and even less reaching before-nothingness. Even the formatting of a hard-drive in a computer, which rids the computer of all information stored in it, cannot adequately explain a before-nothing state.

What then can we say about existence and meaning? Shall we adopt the syllogism of Descartes and conclude that, “I think, therefore I am,” or adopt the constructivist positions, such as the common African perceptions of ones existence in terms of others, out of the frustrations of inadequate explanations of what existence and meaning really are? Shall we let the various and complex metaphysical constructs of religion and philosophy rule our understanding of existence and meaning? Or, shall we let socialization take its course and accept that the human predicament is indeed our leading source of understandings of existence and meaning?

As I engage in this quest I find myself wondering whether this is a lost cause already reflected in philosophy, religion, and other epistemologies or if it is something worth pursuing. Then I wonder if there should be a reason for pursuing this quest or if one should just pursue it for no reason. In a world where the purpose of any action is a condition sine qua non to engage others in dialogue and reflection, one can hardly resist the temptation of having to give a reason for inquiring as if without that reason or purpose the inquiry is futile. In fact, it follows that some reasons are considered better than others as if an objective hierarchy of reasons exist and must at all times be revered. As if this was not enough trouble, one’s inquiry has to be backed up by preciseness of communication (i.e., what), purpose (i.e., why), and epistemology (i.e., how). It is these sort of rules that, added to other reflectors of human finitude, do not allow us to desire a genuine stripping of ourselves from already embraced constructs of existence and meaning for it is easier to pursue inquiry from the standpoint of the already embraced constructs than from a standpoint of a before-nothing state. In fact, I recognize the almost-impossible nature of the task at hand, yet the recognition of the potential deriving from such framework of inquiry is of proportions unknown to humans. This could be the revolution of inquiry, in which inquiry is not based on any construct or epistemology; therefore, the understanding and explanation of existence and meaning would not be based on constructs or epistemologies. Consequently, philosophy, religion, theories, sciences, ideologies, and knowledge systems, etc., would not be needed to inquire and explain existence and meaning. This is not nihilism or ex-nihilism or any sort of theory presupposing the death of everything, but it is a challenge to human inquiry by engaging us in a trip to a state before-nothing as the ultimate tool for genuine inquiry. God, faith, religion, theories, constructs, philosophy, sciences, etc., will not be ruled out from anyone’s world; yet, as a starting point of inquiry, the genuine inquirer will make an effort to rid his or her mind from the existing constructs and understandings.

My own life has been a journey of inquiry, but whose has not? In order to understand partly the journey that I have taken with inquiry it is important that the role of my poetry be briefly exposed. My poetry plays an indispensable part of my life because through it I have painted a portrait of myself, have interpreted my life-journey, deconstructed existing paradigms and interpretations and constructed meaning for my own life. This meaning is immersed in the constructed meanings of others around me and the conventionally accepted constructions of social reality. What is held as truth is not necessarily what I hold as truth, but how can I ever win the constructed truths held for many generations and some of which spread by forces stronger than I, e.g., colonialism, religion, tradition and culture, family ties, friendship circles, fashion, etc.

Through the wisdom of poetry I have traveled the paths of agnosticism and even of nihilism and have become aware of a world without gods, demons, spirits, religion, and a world made of nothingness and in which nothingness is celebrated. Also, and ironically, I have traveled the world of religions, beliefs, traditions, sciences, laws, and other organized life-styles only to learn fear, dependence, and to reckon the complexity of the world entangled by the threads of human ego and thirst for power. I learned that one of man’s greatest fears is to loose favor with something, e.g., himself, others, or a god. This fear explains the dichotomies of man’s selfishness or selflessness, religious or anti-religious attitude, and social or anti-social behaviors. Life and existence are defined better in terms of fears.

The statement in the previous paragraph seems contradictory to my earlier assertion that I was fearless to the point of embracing death; however, what the assertion means is that my fear of death led me to embrace it and befriend it in order to be on the side of what most of us fear the most. In essence, there is no state of fearlessness, but there is such only in relation to previous fears. Fear is an aspect of life essential in our reinventing our destiny; therefore, fear is essential in constructing the structure and standards for daily living. In religious terms, the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom and, in my own terms, the fear of man is an aspect of that beginning of wisdom for one cannot fear God unless one fears man and resorts in taking refuge in God or some entity regarded as being above man. The world of man is frightening and so is the world of spirits; consequently, to be on the right side is always a quest worth pursuing and it is honorable because it shelters man from the minor yet dangerous enemies.

My poetry and reflections have taught me to both fear “fear” and befriend fear. Fear, when feared, becomes an enslaving and torturing energy in the universe of one’s life; yet, when befriended, fear becomes a liberating energy because one is conscious of fear like is conscious of an enemy and devotes part of time in attempting to understand the strengths and weaknesses of fear. The first condition is achieved easily because it is inherent in the human condition, yet the latter is a life-long odyssey.

As the world becomes more industrialized and technological, and as the sense of urgency is deeply succumbed in our life-styles, we have created and allowed more fears to live among us – although it may seem like our struggle is continually and successfully, that of eliminating fears, particularly those we regard to be based on superstitious and pre-modern legends. Apart from the creation of more sophisticated fears, one should also question whether the motivating force in the fight against fears regarded to be based on superstition and pre-modern legends is not the very fear of such fears. I find this philosophy of fear to be logical as those engaged in the scientific method and other epistemologies find their epistemologies to be logical. My epistemology needs not be right or wrong, linear or circular, good or bad, superior or inferior, etc., because there can be no epistemology invented by man that can bypass man’s inherent inclination to self-satisfaction. Epistemologies often presuppose that there is a way of knowing that surpasses the confines of self and bias; yet, thinking that way elevates an epistemology to a level of superiority and makes it essentially biased.

Like fear, bias is inherent in humans. One’s interpretation of reality is often superior or better than another’s interpretation. The world of rules and interpretation of such rules is a world of bias. For instance, “Thou shall not…” necessitates bias on the side of both the one who utters and the one who interprets – and, so it is with all rules. My bias is supportive of multi-paradigmatic advocates; thus, I admit that even individuals who, like me, legitimize diverse paradigms of interpretations are not exempt from bias.

MY BOOK AS MY ITHAKA (Gk. JOURNEY) By José Cossa, PhD

In the book Power, Politics, and Higher Education in Southern Africa: International Regimes, Local Governments, and Educational Autonomy[1] I want the reader to experience an important aspect of the journey of human kind towards an imagined noble destiny--a world where equity abides. Recently, a friend introduced me to the writings of the Africa-born Greek poet Constantine Cavafi who mapped this human predicament of a journey in the classic poem Ithaka.[2] Following Cavafi’s Ithaka as an analogy to the sense of journey that I intend the reader to grasp in this book, I would like to offer a similar advice to my readers:

As you set out for your Ithaka,

hope the voyage is a long one,

full of adventure, full of discovery.

(…)

Keep Ithaka always in your mind.
Arriving there is what you are destined for.
But do not hurry the journey at all.
Better if it lasts for years,
so you are old by the time you reach the island,
wealthy with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka to make you rich.

Ithaka gave you the marvellous journey.
Without her you would not have set out.
She has nothing left to give you now.

And if you find her poor, Ithaka won’t have fooled you.
Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,
you will have understood by then what these Ithakas mean.

As Ithaka is to Cavafi so is omorfos kosmos to the lovers of a harmonious and balanced world characterized by values such as Ubuntu, equal rights and justice. My vision in this book is to foster the human will to influence the world by providing informed insight into the complex intersection of power, politics, and higher education.[3]

Through this book, I want my readers to understand that there is no shortcut to reaching an equitable world; thus, their sense of timelessness must prevail in setting out for this noble destiny. The problem of imbalanced power dynamics is not new to human kind yet the hope of one day reaching an equitable world is a dream to cherish. Cherishing this dream means understanding that time is not what matters, but the experiences that the journey provides. This Cavafian insight is compatible to the African worldview that places primacy on the meaning of events, rather than their urgency. Not hurrying the journey does not imply that the destiny is not important, but that doing so helps one to develop a new perspective about the destiny. Within such perspective, even if life turns to be boring in the equitable world, one ought to remember that equity resulted from the noble intention to reach it. Therefore, the appreciation of the marvellous journey is more important than what the destiny might offer and in that way, one’s experiences will have produced a very wise inhabitant of the final destiny.

In my experience, students and policy communities are often weary of processes and eager to see proposed solutions or policy recommendations. Students have asked me why some authors often present a problem and its complexity without providing solutions and academic journals have asked me to add a section with policy recommendations in my writings; both students and academic journals are eager to see some sort of tangible solutions to the world’s problems and often bypass the value of the process. Despite my hope that readers will appreciate this book as a part of the process towards the amelioration of human interactions, particularly those involving international negotiations at the institutional level, I am aware that the desire to see immediate solutions and tangible recommendations is a typical propensity in many humans.

My hope is that reading this book will produce that sense of having gained yet another insight into the phenomena of power dynamics in international negotiations and an appreciation of the contribution of such insight towards a better world. One ought to picture the journey between a world characterized by imbalance of power between international institutions that have influence on the politics and higher education at the local levels and a world where everyone shares power equitably in all affairs.

Allow me to echo the desperate cry of Filippos Pliatsikas in the song “If I could change the world”.[4] My cry is that if I could change the world through this book, I would foster in us (humans) the spirit of Ubuntu as we run world affairs that influence our daily lives and of those whom our institutions serve. I wish that mutual respect and love for fellow humans guide international negotiations, even amidst differences in worldviews. May a world characterized by Ubuntu and equity become our Ithaka and the series of negotiations characterized by mutual respect and love become our series of short-term Ithakas.

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[1] http://www.cambriapress.com/cambriapress.cfm?template=6&bid=234

[2] In “The Canon” by C. P. Cavafi is available online: http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=74&cat=1. The poem is a metaphorical reference to Homer’s narrative of Odyssea’s ten years journey from Troy to his homeland, Ithaka.

[3] Omorfos Kosmos (trans. Greek, beautiful world); Ubuntu (trans. Zulu, humanness)

[4] Original title in Greek “Αν θα μπορούσα τον κόσμο να άλλαζα” [Transliteration: an tha borousa ton kosmo na allaza]

MOZAMBICAN SCHOLAR

Educate a child and she will gain insight into the complex paths of life.