This paper explores relations between literacy education, ideology and politics, based on an analysis of educational reforms during Soviet and US military occupation in North and South Korea. Following the end of the Second World War, anti-illiteracy campaigns in the two Koreas became important means of political socialisation for Koreans amid the…

The purpose of this article is to outline the evolution of biology education in Soviet schools in the 1920s and 1930s. After some introductory consideration of the ideological changes taking place in the field of genetics that impacted on the teaching of science and led to botany being favoured over biology in schools, the first part outlines the…

This article examines how education unfolded as a science in Estonia in the period 1944-1991, i.e. from the second Soviet occupation to the fall of the USSR. Historical analysis of the way prominent scholars and institutions succeeded in overcoming the adverse conditions of that period is conducted by viewing their respective contributions through…

After the Sputnik shock of 1957, the United States initiated education reform, based in part on the hope that technology could facilitate efficient school learning. This development was largely driven by the confrontation between the eastern and western Blocs: on both sides of the Iron Curtain, reformists promoted educational technology for the…

The paper compares the American and Soviet transformations at Kabul University, Afghanistan, during the 1960s to the 1980s explained in terms of Americanisation and Sovietisation. Using new declassified documents from both American and former Soviet archives, the author reveals that both powers attempted to impose their rival models of university…

This article engages with the influence of Soviet educational models and Western European contacts, mediated by historical institutional and cultural legacies in producing specifically Eastern educational variants. A first level of analysis will identify the reasons behind the emergence of these variations. A second and higher level of analysis…