Byrne, Delma
(2008)
BERA review 2006: education research and policy.
Research Papers in Education, 23 (4).
pp. 377-405.
ISSN 0267-1522
Abstract
The review examines the relationship between educational research and policy, from the
post-war period to the present, throughout the United Kingdom. Its purpose is to (a)
illuminate the changing relationship between education research and policy, and (b) to clarify
the different ways in which that relationship is understood. Its overarching purpose is to
enable the education research community to locate current debates about research and policy
within historical and theoretical frames of reference, and to enable researchers to locate
themselves and their work in this contested area.
The review is structured in three main sections. The first explores the shifting meanings of
research and policy, with attention to the ways in which particular definitions of research
produce consequences for the ways in which policy is understood, and vice versa. From these
discussions, which include differences between applied, basic and strategic research, and
between ‘policy science’ and ‘policy scholarship’, the authors offer a typology of education
research–policy relations. The second section explores the meanings of research and policy in
historical context, and examines the growth of research in education from the post-war years
to the 1960s and 1970s. Some of the key themes in the relationship are introduced, and the
historical origins of some current controversies are traced and explored. The third section
looks at the research–policy relationship in the current context, with attention to the growth of
evidence-informed policy-making, and to major disputes and controversies about research
quality and methodologies. Throughout the review the focus is largely on education research
in England, but comparative points, drawn from the history and contemporary experience of
the Centre for Educational Sociology (CES), are made about research-policy relations in
Scotland, as are wider points about international developments.
| Item Type: |
Article
|
| Keywords: |
research and policy; evidence-based policy; research quality; policy science and
policy scholarship; |
| Academic Unit: |
Faculty of Social Sciences > Education |
| Item ID: |
8564 |
| Identification Number: |
https://doi.org/10.1080/02671520701755457 |
| Depositing User: |
Delma Byrne
|
| Date Deposited: |
02 Aug 2017 14:23 |
| Journal or Publication Title: |
Research Papers in Education |
| Publisher: |
Taylor & Francis |
| Refereed: |
Yes |
| URI: |
|
| Use Licence: |
This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available
here |
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