The Back Office of School Reform: Educational Planning Units in German-Speaking Switzerland (1960s and 1970s).

AbstractThe present article investigates what consequences for educational policy and/or educational administration were drawn from the upheavals of the 1960s and 1970s. A popular diagnosis in political science is that political decision-makers were pushed into a “reactive” role. In the context of a general “planning euphoria”, and an increasingly widespread belief in the possibility of shaping the future, educational policy-makers tried to move from reactive to active policy-making by means of “rational educational planning”. This was linked with a new conception of the relationship between educational policy and educational research: during this period, specialist educational planning units were established as part of the educational administration. These were units with scientific or scholarly aspirations, which generated knowledge that was relevant for decision-making and thus helped to identify prospective problems. They planned, designed and supported reform projects, focusing on school reform as an...