First Published in 1995. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

First Published in 1995. This collection of papers was shaped by a variety of colleagues who attended the panel sessions on this topic, organized at the annual meetings of the American Educational Studies Association (1992), the Comparative and International Education Society (1993), and the American Educational Research Association (1994). The inspiration for this volume are the many policy makers, teacher educators and teacher education students around the world who have struggled and continue to struggle about and in programs to prepare teachers formally. Reading this volume will benefit the individual in that they will not only understand better the challenges they face but also be encouraged and empowered to pursue their ‘political’ goals, particularly those aimed at creating a world in which power and resources are distributed in a just and equitable manner.

Viv Ellis, Lauren Gatti and Warwick Mansell present a unique and international analysis of teacher education policy. Adopting a political economy perspective, this distinctive text provides a comparative analysis of three contrasting welfare state models – the US, England and Norway – following the 2008 Global Financial Crisis (GFC). Arguing that a new political economy of teacher education began to emerge in the decade following the GFC, the authors explore key concepts in education privatisation and examine the increasingly important role of shadow state enterprises in some jurisdictions. This topical text demonstrates the potential of a political economy approach when analysing education policies regarding pre-service teacher education and continuing professional development.

'What does politics have to do with it anyway? Why can't we just focus on the academic, professional and technical issues in teacher education - how best to prepare future teachers so that they can help children and youth learn and develop?' For Ginsburg and Lindsay, these questions reveal an incomplete understanding both of politics and teacher education. The general purpose of their book is to develop more fully our understanding so that we can ask more fruitful questions. To aid this process the volume combines in a coherent and compelling way the work of scholars with a range of disciplinary approaches, theoretical perspectives and societal experiences. The range of countries covered in this volume - in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, North America and the Pacific - offers insights on the topic that might not otherwise be recognized in case studies of countries that tend to be reported in the literature.

The contributors to this volume explore challenges and dilemmas around professional learning that confront educators in Australia. The book is organised around three dimensions of professional learning: professionalism, identity formation and communal sites of professional learning. It addresses important questions. In what ways do policies and practices mediate the construction of 'a professional' among current and future educators? How do communal spaces shape the professional learning of educators? What are the tensions that emerge in the construction of professional identity through professional learning? As a whole, all chapters provide insight into the dynamic nature of 'professional becoming'.

'The Politics of Education' provides an introduction to both the political dimensions of schooling and the politics of recent educational reform debates. The book offers both undergraduates and starting graduate students in education an understanding of numerous dimensions of the contested field of education, addressing questions of political economy and class, cultural politics, race, gender, globalisation, neoliberalism, and biopolitics. Discussions work through contemporary reform debates that include some of the most widely discussed reform topics such as school privatisation, standardised testing, common core curriculum, discipline, and technology. The book covers contemporary educational debates and seriously considers views across the political spectrum from the vantage point of critical education, emphasising schooling for broader social equality and justice.

The International Handbooks of Teacher Education cover major issues in the field through chapters that offer detailed literature reviews, designed to help readers to understand the history, issues and research developments across those topics most relevant to the field of teacher education from an international perspective. This volume is divided into two sections: Teacher educators; and, students of teaching. The first examines teacher educators, their role, and the way that role influences the nature of teaching about teaching. In turn, the second explores who students of teaching are, and how that influences the relationship between teaching and learning about teaching.