Paper prepared for the CPSA Annual Conference, Ryerson University, Toronto, May 30 – June 2, 2017 Do not cite or quote without permission of the author THE END OF THE LOCAL SCHOOL? A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF SCHOOL CHOICE POLITICS IN SWEDEN AND FRANCE1 Anne Lachance, Queen’s University This article examines the politics of school choice in Sweden and France. It seeks to explain why Swedish reformers succeeded in abolishing the residentially-based school system, while equally motivated French politicians could only implement a modest relaxation of residence-based admission criteria. To understand this variation in policy outcomes, I take a two-fold institutional and coalitional approach. First, I argue that Swedish institutions were more open to change than French institutions, especially at the implementation stage. Second, Swedish reformers attracted a broader support for their policies. Even after the right-wing government lost power, the Social Democrats could not find enough support in Parliament to reform the new system as much as they wanted. In France, the government was unable to build a coalition that was broad enough to fully implement its policy agenda. The collaboration with local governments was difficult, and unions protested strongly against the reform. During the last 25 years, the spread of school choice policies has been the most important trend in the evolution of education systems in advanced democracies (Musset, 2012). School choice reforms share the objective of breaking the traditional link between public schooling and neighbourhood (Berry Cullen, 2005). In choice-based education systems, there no longer is a ‘local public school’ frequented by all the children who live nearby. Residence-based admission criteria are weakened, and families are empowered to select from several school options. As a result, public schools must compete to attract students. By positing parents as consumers and schools as competing service providers, school choice policies create ‘educational markets’ (Feinberg and Lubienski, 2008: 2). In 1994, only a handful of countries had implemented school choice arrangements (OECD, 1994). However, by 2010, nearly two-thirds of OECD countries had followed their lead (Musset, 2012). One of the countries that moved the furthest in this direction is Sweden. After the 1991 election, center-right parties formed a coalition government, thereby ending nine years of social democratic rule. The government undertook reforms that radically transformed the way education was delivered. It replaced the residentially-based system with a universal school voucher system, in which families were given a tuition voucher that they could use in any school (Proposition 1992/93:230).2 The voucher system not only included public schools, but also schools run by private groups (called “free schools” in Sweden). Vouchers used in free schools were worth 85% of the value of vouchers used in public schools (Proposition 1991/92:95). That percentage was lowered to 75% in 1994, after the Social Democrats came back to power. However, they reversed their decision in 1996, and free schools began to receive the same amount per student as public schools (Proposition 1995/96:200). The transition towards a choice-based education system, therefore, was accepted by all the major political parties by the middle of the 1990s. At the opposite end of the spectrum, the French government failed to abolish its residentially-based school system, even though the main candidates in the 2007 election supported school choice reforms. In fact, one of Nicolas Sarkozy’s core electoral promises was to abolish the ‘school map,’3 which had been used to organize the attribution of students to public schools since 1 This project is supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. 2 The “Proposition” is the bill passed in Parliament. It is listed under Sveriges Regeringen in the bibliography. 3 The school map divides French departments in small zones. All students who reside in a zone are expected to attend the same public school (Van Zanten and Obin 2010). 1 Paper prepared for the CPSA Annual Conference, Ryerson University, Toronto, May 30 – June 2, 2017 Do not cite or quote without permission of the author 1963. After the abolition of the school map, Sarkozy argued, families would be able to choose any public school that fitted their needs better than the neighbourhood school (Soulé, 2007). His main opponent in the election, the socialist Ségolène Royal, also said she supported the abolition of the school map, before she reconsidered her position and argued for a relaxation of residence-based admission criteria (Soulé, 2006a). After Sarkozy’s election, the new Education Minister, Xavier Darcos, was asked to launch the education reforms. In the spring of 2007, residence-based admission criteria were relaxed (Education nationale, 2007a). This was supposed to be the first step in the progressive abolition of the school map, which Darcos expected to complete by 2010 (Education nationale, 2007b). However, he never took a second step in that direction. Instead, the commitment to abolish the school map was abandoned. This article seeks to explain why Swedish politicians succeeded in abolishing the residentially-based school system while equally motivated French politicians were unable to do so. To understand this variation in policy outcomes, I will take a twofold ‘institutional’ and ‘coalitional’ approach. First, I argue that Swedish institutions were more open to change than French institutions, especially at the implementation stage. Indeed, Swedish policy makers faced few obstacles after winning the support of Parliament, and previous education reforms facilitated the introduction of school choice. In contrast, the French government had many challenges to overcome at the implementation stage. In particular, it had to negotiate with local authorities with which it shared authority over the school map. Second, I argue that the Swedish actors succeeded at building a broader coalition in favour of school choice policies than their French counterparts. In Sweden, the left was divided over school choice policies: the Social Democrats and the small Left Party were against the reforms, while the Green Party supported the changes. Furthermore, teachers’ unions did not strongly oppose the reforms. In France, while the Socialists were divided over this issue during the electoral campaign, the left parties and their allies ultimately opposed a united front against the reforms after the election. The article is organized in four sections. The first focuses on the theoretical approach used in the paper. In the second section, the methods used to collect data are presented. The third and fourth sections of the article respectively examine the Swedish and French cases. Historical Institutionalism, the Power Resources Theory, and Policy Change To understand why Swedish policymakers succeeded in abolishing the residentially-based school system while their French counterparts could not, this article takes a twofold approach which combines historical institutionalism and the power resources theory. Historical institutionalism provides tools to understand the way institutional change unfolds, and emphasizes the importance of timing and sequencing in explaining political outcomes. However, this approach lacks a theory of action when it comes to explaining policy change. Therefore, it will be supplemented with the power resources theory, an approach which clearly identifies the driving forces behind institutional reforms. Historical institutionalism Like other variants of new institutionalism, historical institutionalism seeks to elucidate the role that institutions play in determining political outcomes (Hall and Taylor, 1996: 936). Historical institutionalists argue that the existing institutions of a polity constrain the political process, since the forces driving change are mediated by contextual features inherited from the past (Hall and 2 Paper prepared for the CPSA Annual Conference, Ryerson University, Toronto, May 30 – June 2, 2017 Do not cite or quote without permission of the author Taylor, 1996: 941). Political institutions, state structure, and state-interest groups relations therefore all shape politics (Immergut, 1998: 17). The most distinctive feature of historical institutionalism is its understanding of historical development, which it considers to be ‘path-dependent.’ Path-dependency refers to the way the initial steps taken in a direction conditions further movement on the same path (Pierson 2000, 74). Pierson (2000: 76) argued that institutions go through three phases: first, an initial critical juncture begins a movement towards a certain path; second, the institution enters its 'phase of reproduction,' in which positive feedback reinforces the trajectory that was initiated earlier; and third, the path ends when new events transform the previous equilibrium. In between these critical junctures, therefore, institutions are relatively stable. As Pierson puts it, during the reproduction phase, “change continues, but it is bounded change.” (Pierson, 2000: 76). Many scholars have used some form of the path-dependency argument over the last decades (e.g. Mahoney, 2001; Capoccia and Kelemen, 2007), while other authors have developed tools to understand bounded change that occur in between crises (e.g. Hacker, 2004; Thelen, 2004; Streek and Thelen, 2005). While historical institutionalism is helpful to explain how institutions constrain