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How have nation-states, churches, and philanthropists historically responded to disability and deviance in Europe and North America? Age-old strategies of care, compensation, and rehabilitation will be contrasted with contemporary appeals to equal opportunities, rights, and participation (inclusion). Comparative studies of educational system development and disability policy reform show the extent to which these differing ideals have been reached in the Atlantic world since the mid-1800s. Special education offers a vital but neglected field to examine the trade-offs between principles of merit and equality and the resulting educational and social inequalities.

This cross-nationally comparative project for the OECD examines the state of knowledge concerning transitions of youth and young adults with disabilities beyond secondary education in Germany, Austria and German-speaking Switzerland. Focusing first on access to vocational training, higher education, and employment, the study identifies the results of educational and social policies and local practices, asking how educational quality and equality can be strengthened for this disadvantaged group. Secondly, the project investigates transition patterns within tertiary education and on to employment in order to build a catalog of factors that facilitate or hinder successful transitions, which will be used to guide a larger cross-national longitudinal study.

The working title of Lisa Pfahl's dissertation is „Special School-Leavers Transitioning from School to Work. Discursive and Biographical Constructions of Learning Disability”. This research project reconstructs how discursive knowledge of disability contributed to institutionalisation of educational inequality. Special schools also shape the interactive constitution of the self and biographical action. At the center of this inquiry is how — and if — individuals with less education achieve agency in the German educational system. The educational system is conceptualized as an instance of subjectivation, which I analyze in a twofold manner. Firstly, I recount the discourses of academic special education theorists and practitioners.