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GLOBAL HISTORIES OF EDUCATION
Rita Hofstetter
Bernard Schneuwly
Global Histories of Education
Series Editors
Christian Ydesen
Department of Culture and Learning
Aalborg University
Aalborg, Denmark
Klaus Dittrich
Literature and Cultural Studies
Education University of Hong Kong
Tai Po, Hong Kong
Linda Chisholm
Education Rights and Transformation
University of Johannesburg
Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa
We are very pleased to announce the ISCHE Global Histories of Education
book series. The International Standing Conference for the History of
Education has organized conferences in the field since 1978. Thanks to
our collaboration with Palgrave Macmillan we now offer an edited book
series for the publication of innovative scholarship in the history of
education.
This series seeks to engage with historical scholarship that analyzes edu-
cation within a global, world, or transnational perspective. Specifically, it
seeks to examine the role of educational institutions, actors, technologies
as well as pedagogical ideas that for centuries have crossed regional and
national boundaries. Topics for publication may include the study of edu-
cational networks and practices that connect national and colonial
domains, or those that range in time from the age of Empire to decoloni-
zation. These networks could concern the international movement of
educational policies, curricula, pedagogies, or universities within and
across different socio-political settings. The ‘actors’ under examination
might include individuals and groups of people, but also educational appa-
ratuses such as textbooks, built-environments, and bureaucratic paper-
work situated within a global perspective. Books in the series may be single
authored or edited volumes. The strong transnational dimension of the
Global Histories of Education series means that many of the volumes
should be based on archival research undertaken in more than one coun-
try and using documents written in multiple languages. All books in the
series will be published in English, although we welcome English-language
proposals for manuscripts which were initially written in other languages
and which will be translated into English at the cost of the author. All
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into the overall aims and framing of the ISCHE Global Histories of
Education book series. Proposals and queries should be addressed to
[email protected]. Preliminary inquiries are welcome and encouraged.
Rita Hofstetter • Bernard Schneuwly
The International
Bureau of Education
(1925–1968)
“The Ascent From the Individual to the Universal”
Rita Hofstetter Bernard Schneuwly
Université Genève Université Genève
Genève, Switzerland Genève, Switzerland
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2024. This is an Open access publication.
Open Access This book is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution
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v
vi FOREWORD
historians, some early in their careers, others more experienced, have con-
tributed over five years.1 The specific contributions of each of them enrich
this volume, which is therefore indebted to the dense seminars of collec-
tive work. We will not fail to refer to them at the appropriate points. Three
theses have also been completed. Boss (2022) approaches the IBE by pen-
etrating the beating heart of the Secretariat: via prosopographical
approaches, she sheds light on the profiles and trajectories of its members
and examines their working tools and techniques, as well as their social
circles and networks of collaborations. This allows her to identify how the
premises of comparative education as a new disciplinary field were built
up, step by step, through conferences, surveys and exhibitions. Brylinski
(2022) focuses on the IBE as an intergovernmental agency, questioning
its “utopia” of recommending peaceful education at a time of heightened
nationalism. Her specificity resides in the critical look at the (mis)alliances,
consultations and negotiations that allowed the construction of this inter-
governmentalism by pointing out, thanks to enlightening network analy-
ses, the political interferences in this forum which was supposed to be
preserved from them. As for Loureiro’s thesis (forthcoming), it is distin-
guished by the emphasis placed on the interconnections with Latin
America, in order to identify the modalities, channels and contents circu-
lating in both directions, between the international Geneva of the inter-
war period and South America, which was also aspiring to identify itself on
the international scene. Specific case studies, such as Brazil, also make it
possible to identify how its representatives reappropriated constructed
knowledge and participated in its redefinition.
International scientific seminars organised by the authors and by
Érhise have provided the opportunity to discuss specific methodological,
Joëlle Droux, Cécile Boss, Émeline Brylinski, Aurélie De Mestral, and Michel Christian,
1
Anouk Darme-Xu, Blaise Extermann, Marie-Élise Hunyadi, Irina Leopoldoff, Valérie Lussi
Borer, Clarice Loureiro, Frédéric Mole, Anne Monnier, Viviane Rouiller and Sylviane
Tinembart.
FOREWORD vii
2
Abdeljalil Akkari and Thibaut Lauwerier (University of Geneva), Iván Bajomi (Eötvös
Loránd University, Budapest), Jeremy Burman (Groningen University), Léonora Dugonjić-
Rodwin (Uppsala University, IDHES, École normale supérieure-Paris Saclay), Joyce
Goodman (University of Winchester), Martin M. Grandjean (University of Lausanne), Alix
Heiniger (University of Fribourg), Daniel Laqua (Northumbria University, Newcastle),
Claire Lemercier (CNRS—Centre for the sociology of organisations, Paris), Damiano
Matasci (Universities of Lausanne and Geneva), Antonio Nóvoa (University of Lisbon),
Emmanuelle Picard (École normale supérieure, Lyon), André Robert (University of Lyon 2
Lumière), Marc Ratcliff and his team (Camille Jaccard, Ariane Noël) (University of Geneva),
Rebecca Rogers (University of Paris Descartes), Gita Steiner-Khamsi (Norrag and Columbia
University), Françoise Thébaud (University of Avignon) and Sylvain Wagnon (University of
Montpellier).
viii FOREWORD
References
Boss, C. (2022). Une histoire des pratiques de comparaison du Bureau international
d’éducation. Contextes et trajectoires collectives (1925–1945) [Unpublished doc-
toral thesis, University of Geneva]. https://archive-ouverte.unige.ch/
unige:164477
Brylinski, É. (2022). Recommander l’utopie? Construction d’une coopération inter-
gouvernementale par le Bureau international de l’éducation au milieu du 20e
siècle [Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Geneva]. https://archive-
ouverte.unige.ch/unige:164046
Loureiro, C. (forthcoming). La coopération pédagogique promue par le Bureau
international d’éducation (BIE): les interconnexions avec l’Amérique latine
(1925–1952) [Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Geneva].
Contents
1 G
eneral Introduction 1
The IBE: A Matrix for Educational Internationalism 3
An Increasingly Universal Orientation 4
Universal/Universality: Conceptual Tools for an Investigation 6
Our Theme: The Universal and the IBE—Ambitions, Limits and
Contradictions 9
Structure of the Book: Five Complementary Points of View 11
Exploiting Exceptional Documentary Heritage 17
In View of a Conclusion 20
References 21
2 The
Primacy of Education to Pacify the World? 31
Compensating for the Shortcomings of the Treaty of Versailles 32
Dithering at the LoN 35
The Institut Rousseau, Figurehead of Educational
Internationalism? 37
References 44
3 The
IBE: A Federating Platform 47
A Corporate Association, Gilded with Great Names 47
The Perilous Challenge of Federating Social Movements 51
ix
x Contents
4 A
chieving Intergovernmental Legitimacy 61
Creating New Bodies, Sealing New Alliances 61
The First Intergovernmental Conference on Education 65
References 71
5 During
the War, the IBE Prepares the Post-War Period 75
Preserving Its Mission of Educational and Intellectual Mutual
Aid 76
Getting Recognition for the IBE’s Pioneering Work 78
References 80
6 “A
Marriage of Convenience” with UNESCO? 83
Preparing Negotiations to Remain Autonomous 83
Granting the IBE “All the Honours as UNESCO’s ‘Father’
and Assigning it the Role of ‘Little Brother’” 87
References 91
7 Towards
a Destabilising Universality: The Swan Song? 95
A Process Full of Pitfalls 95
“Like the Phoenix, the IBE Will Rise from Its Ashes” 99
References 101
8 F
rom the Institut Rousseau to the IBE: Promoting a
New Era111
A “Copernican Revolution” Endorsed by Psychopedagogy 112
A Positioning Intended to Embody the “spirit of Geneva” 114
A Unifying and Reconciling Neutrality? 117
References 125
Contents xi
9 Facing
Equivocations, Tightrope Acrobatics129
Avoiding Any Ambiguous Link … with the NEF Too 129
In the LoN’s Compromising Sphere of Influence 131
Challenging the IIIC by Advocating Neutrality, Objectivity
and Diversity 134
References 146
10 The
IBE Axiom: “Rising from the Individual to the
Universal”149
Universalisable Knowledge and Teaching Methods 149
Command Nature by Obeying It: From Egocentrism to
Solidarity 151
Democracy and Conflicts of Reciprocity 154
Universal Aims: Cultural Diversities vs World Culture 157
References 161
11 Scenography
of the First Intergovernmental Parliament
on Education171
An Almost Perennial Rationale 171
Adjustments for a Larger Audience 176
Analysing the Main Features of the Education World 179
Resolving the Crucial Education Problems of the Planet 181
References 187
12 A
Commitment That Was All the More Binding Because
It Was Freely Chosen189
Making Freedom a Responsibility 189
Firmer Contractualisation, Under the Patronage of UNESCO 192
“Hypocrisy, a Tribute Paid by Vice to Virtue?” 196
An Original Sin: The Instrumentalisation of Expertise? 198
References 199
xii Contents
13 “Raising
Comparative Education to the Level of
Intergovernmental Cooperation”201
Rosselló’s Dynamic Comparative Pedagogy 202
Piaget’s Psychopedagogical Theories Transposed to the ICPEs 205
References 212
14 Towards
a Universality of Voices223
Steady Growth in the Number of Countries Interacting with
the IBE 223
A More Inclusive Universality 225
References 228
15 Joining
the IBE? The Influence of Global Power Relations231
Lobbying: A Matter of Survival 231
Three Waves of Membership 234
Regions of the World Unevenly Represented 236
References 242
16 Contradictions
Linked to the Universalist Aim245
Authoritarian Regimes and the Call for Democracies 245
Interference of the Cold War 250
References 258
17 Education
Is a Political Issue261
Loosening the Colonial Straitjacket 262
Nothing Could Restrain the “Irreversible Determination”
of the African Continent 265
The Formalist Position Challenged in the Name of Human
Dignity 268
The Expulsion of Portugal, a Service to “All Humanity” 270
“The fact that we are weak politically […] is the strength
of our objective and active neutrality” 272
References 278
Contents xiii
18 School
Subjects in the Service of Peace and the Individual291
School Subjects: Contrasted and Complementary 292
Different Methods According to the Type of Subject 294
Content and Development of the Child 300
Balance in the Teaching Content 301
References 304
19 Teachers:
“Architects of the Future of Humanity” 307
A High Level of Pedagogical Training 308
Training All Teachers in Higher Education Institutions 309
Education Sciences: The Profession’s Reference Discipline 310
Opposing Ideologies Subtly Expressed 313
The Status of Teachers 314
References 317
20 On
the Fate of Women: “Equality Does Not Mean
Identity”319
Pioneering International Surveys 320
Male Bastions Solidly Preserved 322
1952: Putting an End to Relegation “the Sanctuary of the
Family” 324
The Essentialisation of Differences… 325
Equality, but Under What Conditions? 328
In a “Democracy of Utopia”… 330
The Tipping Point Towards Raising Awareness of Girls’ Rights
to Education? 331
References 333
21 From
Educational Justice to Social Justice337
A Proactive Policy for Educating the World 338
From the Right to Be Different, to the Difference in Rights 340
Fighting Illiteracy, Symbol of Modern Slavery 344
Behind Equal Opportunity for All, a Tenacious Ideology of Merit 345
References 349
xiv Contents
22 The
“Family of Nations” and Its Racial, Cultural and
Colonial Discriminations351
The Equality of Races and Cultures, a “Fine Theme for Speeches
but Discrimination Remains” 352
The Colonies: From Invisibilisation to a Raising of Awareness 354
Between Resilience and Community of Suffering? 358
The Debt the West Owes to the East and the South 360
“An Unfortunate Human Race” Clinging to a Little Rock 362
References 364
General Conclusion371
Appendices383
Sources391
References395
Index419
Abbreviations1
1
Only those abbreviations that appear in more than one chapter have been included in
this list.
xv
xvi ABBREVIATIONS
R Recommendation
UIA Union of International Associations
UN United Nations
UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation
WFEA World Federation of Education Associations
List of Figures
Fig. 8.1 Networks between Germany and other states in the section
on peace education of the Bulletins from 1929 to 1932
(Note: in this presentation, we don’t differentiate the
contents of the links) 122
Fig. 8.2 Networks between the USA and other states in the section
on peace education of the Bulletins from 1929 to 1932
(Note: in this presentation, we do not differentiate the
contents of the links) 124
Fig. 11.1 General schema of the ICPEs’ scenography (1934–1968):
global organisation and zoom on the course of the ICPEs 178
Fig. 11.2 References to educational models during the 1934 ICPE,
by state 185
Fig. 11.3 Graphical representation of quotes on the issue of
compulsory schooling (ICPE, 1951). (a) Unimodal network
(1951), extracted sub-network, based on citation links that
“value the educational experience of states.” (b) Bimodal
network, subnetwork selected from Ceylon, India, Iran,
Israel and Pakistan tops 186
Fig. 14.1 Participation in surveys (yearly average), national reports in
the Yearbook, presence at ICPEs, membership in the IBE
from 1934 to 1968 224
Fig. 15.1 Structure of revenue from 1929 to 1967 by percentage 240
xvii
xviii List of Figures
xix
xx List of Images
Image IV.1 Caricature of Jean Piaget, director of the IBE, 1939. At this
moment, he was also professor at the universities of Geneva
and Lausanne, as written in the caption, and co-director of
the Institut Rousseau. At the age of 43, he was already well
known: his books were translated into several languages; he
was invited by many universities and received an honorary
doctorate from Harvard in 1936. (© AJP) 221
Image 14.1 New South Wales response to the survey concerning school
systems (1931). This survey, the first worldwide on public
education, was published in French in 1933 under the title
“The Organisation of Public Education in 53 Countries”:
an important step in comparative education. (© IBE) 225
Image 15.1 IBE revenues and expenditures in 1939. The incomes from
membership fees were not very high (64,460.- CHF), if one
takes into account that the fee was fixed at 10,000.- CHF:
there were sixteen state members and few of them paid their
duty in this period of crisis. The total income (142,577.-
CHF) nonetheless exceeded the expenditures (95,534.-
CHF). (© IBE) 235
Image 16.1 Draft for asking for correction of the intervention of the
Byelorussian delegate in the minutes of the IBE Council
1965. He complained that the question of translation into
Russian was not on the agenda of the IBE Council. Similar
letters can be found for Spanish, German and Arabic. Such
requests led to a survey by the IBE to determine which
languages should be given priority, and to ask states to
finance these translations. No one was willing to cover these
costs. The delegate addresses also the issue of borders on
the Oder and Neisse rivers, revanchist and militarist ideas
being promoted in school textbooks and exhibitions of the
Federal Republic of Germany which considered itself as the
only German state. (© IBE) 249
Image 17.1 Extract from the provisional minutes of the 1964
ICPE. The African Delegation appeals to the other
delegates to exclude colonial Portugal from the conference
referring to its cruel subjection of African peoples, the
ongoing struggle for liberation and UNESCO’s anticolonial
principles. (© IBE) 265
Image 18.1 A double page from a Spanish school atlas, 1961. This atlas
is part of the IBE’s school book collection. The question of
geography was discussed in the 1939 and 1949 ICPEs, with
strong stress on international comprehension and against
xxiv List of Images
xxv
CHAPTER 1
General Introduction
The whole world puts its hope in education. It needs an energetic, active,
enterprising educational organisation, able to penetrate everywhere, to put
everything to work, to make the most of everything. If we do not become
that organisation in a short time, another one, or others, will be created and
we will have no reason to exist. It would undoubtedly only be half bad if
these organisations presented the same guarantees of objectivity and of sci-
entific serenity as the IBE, which lives in the atmosphere of pure scientific
idealism of the J. J. Rousseau Institute, of political and religious neutrality
which is that of the Swiss Confederation, and the advanced international
spirit of Geneva. But this would not be the case, because it is impossible to
find these three conditions combined elsewhere. (Marie Butts, Secretary
General, Report to the Council of IBE, 21.10.1927, p. 2)1
At the end of the Great War, the whole world would confer on educa-
tion a redeeming mission. This was obvious to the Secretary General of
the International Bureau of Education (IBE), who defended with convic-
tion—here in 1927—the uniqueness of the Bureau that the Institut
Rousseau2 had just set up in Geneva (1925). According to Marie Butts,
only that particular Bureau could provide all the guarantees of credibility
1
AdF/A/1/2/36, AIJJR.
2
Also called École des sciences de l’éducation [School of sciences of education], a centre for
psychopedagogical research and documentation.
6
A previous collective work (Hofstetter & Érhise, 2022), the only large-scale historical
research devoted to this organisation at the time, bears this title; given its importance for our
book, we specify its status in our foreword and refer to it specifically in the parts which build
on this knowledge base.
7
The term was in fact used by the very people who were working and pleading at the
beginning of the twentieth century for the construction of new international structures and
mentalities (or were resisting or challenging them) (Geyer & Paulmann, 2001; Herren, 2009).
8
We refer more specifically to: Clavin (2005), Laqua (2013), Reinisch (2016), Reinisch
and Brydan (2021), Saunier (2013) and Sluga and Clavin (2017).
9
See in particular our latest analysis: Droux and Hofstetter (2020), Hofstetter and Droux
(2022), Hofstetter and Schneuwly (2020), Matasci and Hofstetter (2022). Matasci and
Ruppen Coutaz (2023) have most recently used this concept to collectively examine the
circulation of knowledge during the Cold War.
4 R. HOFSTETTER AND B. SCHNEUWLY
and public, who were convinced of the need to apply the methods of inter-
national collaboration to the field of education in order to pacify the
world. The IBE would attempt to be the epicentre of this, by setting itself
up as an international rallying point.
During the immediate post-war decade, the IBE was indeed a signifi-
cant emblem of the mobilising power of civil society, as it strove to stand
out as a federating body for international associations that aspired to build
universal peace through education. Since 1929, set up as an independent
intergovernmental organisation, the first in the field of education, it had
been striving for the universality of its state partners, in order to improve
education systems with them. The internationalism of which it claimed to
be a part aimed to work on a global scale to universalise access to educa-
tion and to define universalisable teaching methods: an educational inter-
nationalism of which it can be considered to be the matrix. It would be a
matrix through the new modes of collaboration and exchange that the
Bureau established: the objectivity and neutrality its founders included in
the statutes of the Bureau from the outset constituted for them the tools
for international action on education systems, the preserve of nations. Its
partners thus profiled the IBE as an intergovernmental centre for com-
parative education, the first IO specializing in the description and com-
parative analysis of public school systems. It was in this capacity that from
1947 onwards the Bureau collaborated with UNESCO, for which it is
considered a precursor. It was also a matrix in defining, studying and dis-
cussing the causes on its agenda: addressing a wide range of problems
deemed crucial to the world’s educational progress, it endeavoured to
construct what its leaders called a charter of “world aspirations for public
education”. In its own way, it inaugurated what we now call the global
education agenda.10
10
Here we take up the notion of “globalization,” historicised and theorised alongside the
ones of “borrowing” and “lending”, by Steiner-Khamsi (2004) later by Steiner-Khamsi and
Waldow (2012).
1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 5
11
Chapman (1988), Ducret (1984), Gruber and Vonèche (1993) remain the best intro-
duction to Piaget’s work. Ratcliff (2011) allows us to know Piaget’s personality in his rela-
tionships with others, which is essential to understand his action at the IBE, but also his
description of the “laboratory of simplicity” (2006), which echoes Burman’s (2012) demon-
stration that Piaget’s scientific work, far from being the product of a “great man”, is the
product of a “factory”, a “factory” of many workers that he directs as a “boss”: an image that
fits perfectly with his role at the IBE (see also Ratcliff & Burman, 2017). As for Kohler
(2009), his advantage is that he has worked on the impressive archival sources of the IBE
(and not the Institut Rousseau, on which he adds nothing new); but he deploys his energy
surprisingly in pointing out the contradictions in Piaget’s involvement with the IBE, with-
out, in our view, sufficiently contextualising what was at stake at the time for the IBE and all
the individual and collective players at work in the creation of these new international bodies
of the time. The challenge was to avoid any teleological interpretation of the tools they were
trying to build step by step to achieve their ends, albeit without the hoped-for success.
6 R. HOFSTETTER AND B. SCHNEUWLY
The IBE was thereby part of the universalist discourse13 of the time which
concerned both the epistemic sphere and its potential for knowledge, and
the ethical sphere linked to the question of values, such as peace, justice,
12
By the way, Piaget’s paper, “Le droit à l’éducation dans le monde actuel” [The right to
education in the modern world], inaugurated the “Human Rights” Collection, published by
UNESCO (1949; 1951 in English).
13
Today, the word “universalism” is often used to refer to the whole of these discourses.
This is a relatively recent term (mid-nineteenth century), applied first and foremost to the
theological field. Statistics show that its use has become more frequent from the 1980s
onwards, probably in connection with the questioning of the “universal” by post-colonial
movements and cultural studies, against which others defend “universalism”. It is thus a
“meta-category” that allows for the analysis of social currents linked to universals or for the
constitution of such movements under the banner of universalism (e.g. Policar, 2021; Wolff,
2019; for an English presentation of the term see Ingram 2014). Balibar seems to us to
perfectly situate the meaning of universalism from a historical point of view and to relativise
the use of the term: It is more useful “to attempt to analyses the differends of universalisms as
the very modality in which the historicity of the universal, or its constitutive equivocity, is
given” (2020, p. 56), the most massive example of these “differends” being the competing
universalisms of monotheisms (one may refer here to Jasper’s idea of an axial period when
monotheisms were invented; Ingram 2014). We ourselves will only use universalism as an
analytical category, especially as it was hardly used by IBE spokespersons, who clearly
favoured universal, universality, sometimes universalist and exceptionally universalisation,
universalisable.
1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 7
health and freedom, to mention just a few of the IO’s flagship ideals at the
time. Since the IBE’s quest for legitimacy in the dense network of other
bodies with the same universal aims is examined here in the light of its
universalist ambitions, we will briefly situate ourselves in recent historiog-
raphy on this subject. These universalist discourses have been the subject
of criticism in major political debates, to the extent that some have spoken
of a “new quarrel”.14 This will allow us to introduce some concepts that
will guide us in our investigations.
Various analyses have shown that, in addition to the just and noble
causes they are supposed to promote, claims to universality have also
turned out to be weapons of oppression and discrimination of peoples,
serving even as a pretext for exploitation and imperialist domination under
the guise of a civilising mission that justified colonialism.15 This overarch-
ing universalism (Merleau-Ponty, 1960, p. 75)—of which human rights
would constitute a modality—was also analysed by some as the result of a
narrative, a product of the dominant historicism (Chakrabarty, 2009),
which made Europe the place where the benefits of human progress had
emerged and were erected as universal: European exceptionalism would
embody the universalism that the rest of the world was supposed to follow
(Diagne, 2018, p. 71), in other words what Bourdieu (1992) once called
the “imperialism of the universal”.
However, the very notion of the universal is rarely questioned on its
merits, and the interpretations that critics provide of it diverge. Indeed,
the universal is an “essentially contested” notion.16 This manifests itself in
the antinomies that appear in the discussions devoted to it. Balibar
14
Somsen (2008) presents a history of universalism in science. For a critique of epistemic
universality and its possible links with power relations, particularly in the social sciences, see
Wallerstein (2006). We shall see that this vision of the possibility of separating the scientific,
or as it was often said, the “technical” and the political, would constitute an essential prob-
lem in the evolution of the IBE.
15
See notably: Barth and Osterhammel (2005), Barth and Hobson (2020), Harrison
(2019), Matasci et al. (2020), Petitjean (2005), Pomeranz (2005) and Weitz (2008). Some
authors claim that the very essence of these rights would involve oppression: “‘Human
rights’ is not only about having or claiming a right or a set of rights; it is also about righting
wrongs, about being the dispenser of these rights. The idea of human rights [carries within
itself the idea that] the fittest must shoulder the burden of righting the wrongs of the unfit”
(Spivak, 2004, p. 523).
16
We are referring to a lecture by Balibar (2021). He takes up Gallie’s (1956) idea of
“essentially contested concepts”, drawing more directly on Capdevila (2004) who analyses
the notion of ideology.
8 R. HOFSTETTER AND B. SCHNEUWLY
identifies and explores three of them which will serve as a compass in our
analysis of the IBE.17 The most well-known is that between the vertical or
overarching universal, on the one hand, and the lateral universal enriched
by experience of the other. The second one is between the extensive uni-
versal which aims first to expand itself and the intensive universal which
operates by the force of principle or emulation. The third between the
abstract universal which functions by subtracting particularities (Kant’s
categorical imperative or, essentially, human rights) and the concrete uni-
versal with the differences or particularities becoming components of the
universal, in the sense of a totality. Any discussion of the concept of uni-
versal would lead to one positioning oneself in the contradictory field
described by these paradoxes.
The discussion around these antinomies itself demonstrates that it is
not so much a question of abandoning the concept of the universal in
favour of particularism,18 as of enriching it according to socio-historical
evolutions. Diagne writes in particular:
The plural that Bandung celebrates is not directed against the universal. On
the contrary, it is its promise. That of a universal which is not an imperial
imposition, but the inscription of the plural of the world on a common
horizon. (2021, p. 150)19
Admittedly, there are positions that are clearly along these lines, particularly in the so-
18
called decolonial movement; for a critical presentation of these movements, see, for example,
Amselle (2011) and Bayart (2010).
19
As is known, “Bandung” was a conference of twenty-nine African and Asian countries
held in April 1955 at which these countries decided to fight colonialism together and to stay
out of great power rivalries; see a more detailed note in Chap. 17.
20
Besides “lateral universalism”, they are called “universal universalism” (Wallerstein,
2006), “universal supplement” (an oxymoron by Balibar, 2020), “reiterative universalism”
(Walzer, 1990), “universalism as a horizon” (Laclau, 1996), “strategic universalism” (Gilroy,
2000), a “singular universality” (Badiou, 1998).
21
For this general characterisation, we rely in particular on Diagne (2014), himself inspired
by the work of Balibar.
1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 9
The notion of progress does not tolerate “cultural circles” in which time is
nailed to space in a reactionary manner but, instead of uniqueness, it needs
a broad, elastic and fully dynamic multiversum, a permanent and often
entangled counterpoint of historical voices. Thus, in order to do justice to
the immense extra-European material, it is no longer possible to work in a
unilinear way, no longer without bulges in the series, no longer without a
new, complicated temporal multiplicity. (Bloch, 1956/1970, p. 38 [our
translation])
22
This idea appears in the texts of Diagne, Amselle, Policar, Butler quoted above, all stress-
ing that translation cannot ignore, on the one hand, questions of dominance and, on the
other hand, the transformation brought about by translation, which makes the translated and
translating languages evolve (Butler, 2000, p. 38). It is Balibar who establishes the link with
the “multiversum” (2020, p. 93).
10 R. HOFSTETTER AND B. SCHNEUWLY
actors themselves,23 and with the IBE Secretariat in the first place, includ-
ing its director, Piaget. In this regard, we will examine how the IBE posi-
tioned itself, in its daily functioning, when faced with different possible
manifestations of the universal: to take up the antinomies pointed out,
between the vertical universal versus the lateral, abstract versus concrete,
extensive versus intensive. More specifically, how did the IBE relate to the
overarching universalism that functioned as the dominant ideology with
its corollary of a civilising mission? To what extent did it succeed in envis-
aging other modalities of constructing the universal that could come close
to the conceptions being discussed and that are well summarised by the
term multiversum? Can we identify any specific features of the role, man-
date and positioning of the IBE in the dense network of international
bodies making education their focus? In particular, we will explore the
following questions: What role did the figure of Piaget and his psychoped-
agogical theory play in this construction, and how did he, together with
his deputy director, the comparatist Pedro Rosselló, and the staff of the
IBE, develop tools capable of meeting (or failing to meet) this universalist
challenge? Would the application of the IBE’s principles of neutrality and
objectivity, if at all effective, enable it to avoid the pitfalls identified, taking
it for granted that they form the basis of exchanges between protagonists
with contrasting points of view? To what extent did the reconfigurations
of the surrounding world, in particular the Cold War and above all the
wave of decolonisation in the 1950s and 1960s, call into question the
foundations of the IBE and require adjustments to the way it operated?
What were the main thrusts of the “global education aspirations” con-
cerning universal access to education and the universalisable principles
developed by the IBE? Given its status as a matrix, might the IBE have
been at the forefront of the development of a series of educational princi-
ples which would have contributed today to the establishment of an edu-
cational dogma by international education agencies? In fact, let us dare to
go one step further: was it not precisely through its principles that the
Bureau ran the risk of a vertical universalism: by not taking a position,
ignoring, or even supporting practices and discourses that denied the
23
One could say that we analyse one dimension of “the universal as reality”, to take again
a formula of Balibar who subsumes there the irreversible process of the appearance “of an
effective interdependence between the elements or units of which one can form what we call
the world” (1997, p. 422).
1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 11
24
Here we find a contradiction inherent in the claim of the “apolitism” of international
organisations that bring governments together. Processes of “depoliticisation” have charac-
terised international organisations since the end of the nineteenth century (Louis &
Maertens, 2021; see also Petiteville, 2017). Scientific objectivity manifested as expertise or
neutrality, but also the claim to a monopoly in a given field seem admittedly necessary to
ensure the functioning of specialised international institutions such as in labour, health or, as
in our case, education, but “politics strikes back” (p. 186): their contents are indeed deeply
political. The IBE adopts these same general principles. The question arises as to whether the
particular approaches it applies to “depoliticise” its action in its quest for the universal and
universality distinguish it from other intergovernmental organisations.
25
See, among others, Bürgi (2017), Elfert and Ydesen (2023) and Ydesen (2019); see also
the earlier work of Maurel (2006, 2010), and Archibald (1993); for the IIIC, another organ-
isation working in the field of education, Renoliet (1999), and more recently Riondet
(2020). The overview of current IOs proposed by Niemann (2022) gives yet another view
of the importance of these organisations and therefore of their history.
12 R. HOFSTETTER AND B. SCHNEUWLY
more particularly on the period when the “IBE spirit” and its modus ope-
randi were consolidated around the annual International Conferences on
Public Education (ICPEs), namely between 1934 and 1968. The last
period, the 1960s, can be considered as its climax marked by a modus
operandi that its very success made inoperative. This is what we will show.
Part III focuses on the ICPEs which were the trademark of the IBE
since 1934; UNESCO was associated with the organisation of these since
1947, demonstrating the importance attached to these conferences at the
time. How could this new “intergovernmental world forum for
education”26 be institutionalised by bringing together nation states jealous
of their educational prerogatives? But conversely, how could an organisa-
tion claim to be completely politically neutral and strictly scientific, when
its main state partners aspired to have their national school policies
endorsed? In this part, we propose to define the conceptual and pragmatic
contours of the “modus operandi” of the aforementioned conferences,
conceived jointly by the two heads of the IBE, Piaget and his deputy direc-
tor Rosselló, by dissecting their scenography, which was also evolving, as
well as the theorisation which formed the basis of it. We are deepening a
hypothesis, previously outlined (Hofstetter & Schneuwly, 2023), namely
that it might be possible to find its sociogenesis by going back to the first
Piagetian theorisations concerning the development and construction of
the child’s intelligence. Could the principles of decentring and reciprocity
not be transposed from the pedagogical sphere to the intergovernmental
scene? This seems to be the mainspring of Piaget’s investment in the IBE
and its ICPEs. With the comparatist Rosselló, the institution was built as
they went along, its creation being original in that it contributed to the
foundation of comparative education, both as an academic discipline and
as a scientific method. It was hoped that international comparative surveys
would provide the data to be documented and then guide what they call
the “global march of education”, drawing on local and national experi-
ences to collectively define recommendations for improving education
worldwide. These recommendations would be all the more binding since
they would be collegially defined and freely agreed upon and reappropri-
ated: they would function both as extensive universals, aimed at the whole
world, as well as intensive universals, with emulation often invoked as a
mechanism for transformation.
26
Where we do not give specific references to quotations, as here, it is because the expres-
sions quoted are scattered throughout the speeches and documents.
1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 15
A utopia? A fiction? But how could such a modus operandi be put for-
ward, when the world was on fire, when the intergovernmental institu-
tions of the first half of the twentieth century were mostly doomed to
disappear, to be replaced by the powerful United Nations and its numer-
ous specialized organisations; and when in education its UNESCO takes a
central place, then, more and more, economic organisations like OECD
and World Bank investing which favour resolutely more constraining
mechanisms of governance?
Changing scale, in Part IV we move on to analyse the relationships that
the IBE maintained with different countries and educational authorities
around the world to encourage them to participate in its activities and to
manage them collectively. We analyse how the IBE implemented its theoreti-
cal principles of action and its modus operandi on a day-to-day basis. The
transnational perspective is of particular importance here, as is the contribu-
tion of political science in identifying the contrasting forms of the relation-
ship between politics and education in a self-proclaimed neutral and
independent intergovernmental body. While the IBE claimed to be universal,
not only in numerical terms but also in terms of equity of treatment and rela-
tions with its state partners, we are interested here in questioning the likely
obstacles encountered, the possible compromises accepted, the inevitable
differentiations established, and the transformations chosen or undergone
to, depending on the interlocutors as well as on geopolitical developments.
We ask ourselves if the very aim of universality does not potentially con-
tain its own contradictions: was the postulated impartiality tenable in the face
of the rise of ideologies that were contrary to the democratic principles
defended by the IBE and which, moreover, interfered in its sphere? Was it
still tenable when the voices and demands of long-oppressed peoples erupted
and firmly raised the question of the political basis of education, as revealed
by the expansionist civilising arguments carried by the myth of development
imposed by the Western empires? How did global political developments—
authoritarianism, the Cold War, the emancipation of colonies—interfere
with the goal of universality? Did these developments collide with the univer-
sal principles of action on which the IBE was based, thereby making it diffi-
cult to situate oneself between vertical and lateral universality?
This part thus allows us to reflect further on the way in which represen-
tatives of education on the one hand and politics on the other27 negotiated
27
Education is represented here by the IBE’s spokespersons and the experts/partners who
support them, while politics is embodied by the ministerial delegates and the states that they
represent during the activities set up by the IBE. The boundaries between these two spheres
are in fact porous (Fehrat, 2021; Hofstetter & Brylinski, 2023; Kott, 2008; Littoz-
Monnet, 2017).
16 R. HOFSTETTER AND B. SCHNEUWLY
their reciprocal relations. In doing so, we will try to identify how the IBE
partners played the game—or not—of depoliticising intergovernmental
consultations on education; simultaneously we will try to see how socially
relevant educational issues were exposed to controversies and divisions
influenced by the geopolitical context.
In Part V, we focus on the causes defended by IBE partners, and
more specifically on the general guidelines and principles that they
believed could be universalised through their ICPEs. Through content
analysis of the thematic surveys, the results and discussions of which
were published in large volumes leading to recommendations that were
disseminated worldwide, the aim is to identify which causes were
favoured and in what form they were translated into recommendations
of universal value. This involves closely observing the evolution of the
themes and positions of the IBE’s protagonists in international surveys
and forums, placing them in the contexts in which they were voiced.
Embracing the systematic analysis of the sixty-five surveys28 which led to
the nineteen ICPEs, set up between 1934 and 1968 (jointly with
UNESCO from 1947 onwards), we are thus able to present the major
strengths of the causes favoured by the IBE: first and foremost, universal
access to the fullest possible education in order to preserve peace and
international understanding. This presupposes both a broad school cul-
ture and qualified and recognised teachers.
We have chosen to examine the causes officially defined by the IBE’s
bodies and partners, in the order of our presentation: school content and
culture, teacher training and working conditions, equal access to school-
ing and improvement of education systems. However, at the same time,
we have also decided to take on board the cross-cutting issues that
imposed themselves through their acuteness and which brought the pro-
tagonists face to face with important contradictions: beyond the beauti-
ful and good causes supposedly common to all the world’s educational
authorities, how were gender and race discrimination, as well as the
asymmetries between the countries of the North and the South, and
between the West and the East, dealt with—stated, denounced, masked
or silenced?
28
Occasionally, we have included surveys that were carried out earlier or that did not result
in an ICPE. In Appendix B we present the surveys discussed in the ICPEs.
1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 17
29
However, we shall confine ourselves here to the speeches made by the protagonists of
the undertaking. Other studies have tried to understand the impact of the IBE’s recommen-
dations on the school policies of the different partner countries by examining how they use
this body to legitimize certain orientations on their national territories; In this respect, see
Relations Internationales, 2020, N°183, in particular the articles by Bajomi (2020) on
Hungary and Robert (2020) on France; Loureiro (forthcoming) on Latin America, and the
project initiated by Matasci and Hofstetter (2022) on Brazil, Cameroon, Turkey and
Vietnam.
30
Three of them were written by our collaborator Émeline Brylinski, whom we thank
warmly here.
31
For the period from 1925 to 1952, documentary resources are partially the same as those
used by Érhise in the 2022 volume; so we take over main elements relating to their descrip-
tion from Hofstetter and Droux (2022, pp. 36–39).
18 R. HOFSTETTER AND B. SCHNEUWLY
32
The IBE has just completed the digitisation of its manuscript archives (1925–1968, i.e.
the equivalent of forty linear metres), which has greatly facilitated our work since 2021.
While the collection of manuals is now partially accessible on the web, the same cannot be
said of the other published sources, in particular all those that precede, accompany and fol-
low on from the ICPEs, that is, tens of thousands of pages, which we had to search manually.
This was particularly tedious for this volume, since we integrated, in addition to the sources
already considered for the collective book Hofstetter and Érhise (2022), all the IBE publica-
tions from 1953 to 1969.
33
We have systematically referred to existing English translations, including the minutes of
the ICPEs since 1947 and those of the Joint Commission meetings. When these translations
were not complete or even wrong, we corrected them, noting this in the reference as “revised
translation,” sometimes with a comment on possible ideological meanings of the translation
made with the support and under the supervision of UNESCO.
1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 19