Monographs by Lukas Graf
Austria, Germany, and Switzerland are increasingly relying on hybridization at the nexus of vocat... more Austria, Germany, and Switzerland are increasingly relying on hybridization at the nexus of vocational training and higher education to increase permeability and reform their highly praised systems of collective skill formation. This historical and organizational institutionalist study compares these countries to trace the evolution of their skill regimes from the 1960s to today‘s era of Europeanization, focusing especially on the impact of the Bologna and Copenhagen processes.
This exploratory study is devoted in equal measure to the status quo and the future perspectives ... more This exploratory study is devoted in equal measure to the status quo and the future perspectives of the internationalisation of dual study programmes, a special hybrid form of vocational training and higher education developed in Germany. Building on the earlier DAAD studies ‘Sachstand: Duales Studium als Exportmodell’ (Maschke 2012) and ‘Modelle und Szenarien für den Export deutscher Studienangebote ins Ausland’ (Schreiterer and Witte 2001; see also DAAD/HRK 2012), the authors examine both the degree of internationalisation of existing dual study programmes in Germany (with special emphasis on students’ geographical mobility) and the possibilities and limits of systematically transferring this emergent educational model to selected countries. Two recent trends have helped put issues of internationalisation and the transfer of German education concepts higher up on the policy agenda again: first, the current economic situation in Germany, which has remained robust despite the recent financial and economic turmoil, reflected most importantly in comparatively low levels of youth unemployment. Dual vocational education and training models are seen as a key factor contributing to this success. Second, the concept of dual studies reflects an emergent model of skill formation at the nexus of initial vocational training and tertiary education. This innovative hybrid form is seen as having the potential to play a crucial role in the development of competencies for twenty-first-century occupations, not least against the backdrop of the pressing skills gap.
This exploratory study is devoted in equal measure to the status quo and the future perspectives ... more This exploratory study is devoted in equal measure to the status quo and the future perspectives of the internationalisation of dual study programmes, a special hybrid form of vocational training and higher education developed in Germany. The authors examine both the degree of internationalisation of existing dual study programmes in Germany (with special emphasis on students’ geographical mobility) and the possibilities and limits of systematically transferring this emergent educational model to selected countries. Two recent trends have helped put issues of internationalisation and the transfer of German education concepts higher up on the policy agenda again: first, the current economic situation in Germany, which has remained robust despite the recent financial and economic turmoil, reflected most importantly in comparatively low levels of youth unemployment. Dual vocational education and training models are seen as a key factor contributing to this success. Second, the concept of dual studies reflects an emergent model of skill formation at the nexus of initial vocational training and tertiary education. This innovative hybrid form is seen as having the potential to play a crucial role in the development of competencies for twenty-first-century occupations, not least against the backdrop of the pressing skills gap.
Steigende Zahlen an Quereinstiegen, sinkende Geburtenraten und höhere Arbeitsplatzanforderungen –... more Steigende Zahlen an Quereinstiegen, sinkende Geburtenraten und höhere Arbeitsplatzanforderungen – all diese Veränderungen stellen Herausforderungen an das deutsche Bildungssystem. Sie erfordern eine höhere Flexibilität in puncto Arbeitszeit und Mobilität, aber auch in Bezug auf die Aneignung von neuen Kompetenzen. Die traditionelle Trennung der Bildungsbereiche Hochschulstudium und berufliche Ausbildung gerät dadurch unter Veränderungsdruck. Starre Bildungssysteme stehen zudem im Widerspruch zu den Wünschen nach einer offenen und gestaltbaren Bildungsbiographie. Um neuen Anforderungen der Arbeitswelt sowie individuellen Bedürfnissen gerecht zu werden, müssen die Übergänge im Bildungssystem erleichtert werden. Zunehmend öffnen sich die Hochschulen daher bereits seit einiger Zeit für beruflich Qualifizierte und es gibt immer mehr Möglichkeiten, individuelle Ausbildungswege zu gehen. Neue Formen der Qualifikation wie duale Studiengänge, die praktische Elemente in die Hochschulausbildung integrieren, sind in den letzten Jahren stark gewachsen. Im Rahmen der vorliegenden Studie werden unterschiedliche regionale Praxisbeispiele analysiert, die zu Durchlässigkeit im Bildungssystem beitragen.
Banscherus, U., Bernhard, N., & Graf, L. (2016). Durchlässigkeit als mehrdimensionale Aufgabe. Bedingungen für flexible Bildungsübergänge. Berlin: Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung.
Journal articles by Lukas Graf
European Educational Research Journal, 2023
European education and training policies have gained momentum with the debt crisis and soaring yo... more European education and training policies have gained momentum with the debt crisis and soaring youth unemployment. In 2013, the 'European Alliance for Apprenticeships' was launched. In Germany, a role model for apprenticeship training in Europe, a national 'Alliance for Initial and Further Training' was signed just one year later. Both Alliances represent a new, experimentalist governance mode, in which a novel steering entity orchestrates stakeholder cooperation. What explains the parallel evolvement of alliances for apprenticeships in Germany and at the EU level? Studying developments around the Alliances in the last two decades, we trace and critically discuss four theorised drivers: (1) German-driven VET governance reforms with a strong influence of German best practices, (2) EU-driven cooperation that influences German VET policies, (3) cross-fertilising reforms and (4) externally driven, parallel reforms in response to governance mega-challenges. Our analysis supports a prevalence of the fourth driver: increasingly complex policy problems push both the EU and Germany to implement policy innovations such as the Alliances for apprenticeship training. In an experimentalist setting that often entails a governance by (seemingly neutral) numbers, benchmarking and learning, this also gives leeway to Germany to present itself as a pioneer of the EU's focus on dual training.
Social Policy & Administration, 2022
Collective skill formation builds on a long tradition of cooperation between state actors, unions... more Collective skill formation builds on a long tradition of cooperation between state actors, unions, and employer associations. As such, it can be considered strongly pathdependent, which also refers to deeply institutionalized arrangements reconciling economic and social objectives across public and private actors. Yet, given structural changes in the economy and crises on the training market, dual apprenticeship training has been increasingly challenged to maintain its balance between economic and social objectives. In this context, I analyse the expansion of shorttrack dual apprenticeship training, which represents a lower-cost, lower-qualification variant of traditional dual apprenticeships in Germany and Switzerland. In these countries-both of which are core examples of collective skill formation systems-such short-tracks were expanded starting in the early 2000s. However, German unions have heavily opposed this expansion, while Swiss unions have actively supported it. I carry out a comparative historicalinstitutional analysis to address this puzzle and unpack the respective change processes. Focussing on the dominant governance modes, I find that in Switzerland, the expansion of short-tracks is linked to path reinforcement in terms of a liberal corporatist system characterized by polite employer domination. In contrast, in Germany I observe that the developments around short-tracks are associated with a path switch from a social to a more liberal collective skill formation arrangement but one that is linked to rather ‘hostile’ employer domination.
Journal of Education Policy, 2022
While the literature in skill formation systems has paid considerable attention to inter-variatio... more While the literature in skill formation systems has paid considerable attention to inter-variation between types of national skill formation systems and intra-variation among individual types as in the case of collective skill formation systems, less is known about the role of the European Union in establishing a European model of skill formation. Building on studies in educational governance and decentralised cooperation, this paper analyses the European Alliance for Apprenticeships (EAfA) and explores its relationship to national skill formation systems. We analyse the emergence of a European model of collective skill formation and offer case studies of Ireland and France to understand how this European model relates to these two contrasting skill formation systems. Through deductive qualitative content analysis of official documents, we show that (a) the EAfA, in resembling characteristics of national collective skill formation systems, promotes the emergence of a European model of collective skill formation, and (b) that Ireland and France show signs of moving further towards adopting elements of a collectivist training model centred on apprenticeship training although mediated by path-dependencies of a liberal (Ireland) and statist (France) skill formation model.
Research in Comparative and International Education, 2021
Against the backdrop of an increasingly interconnected world as well as the growing role of inter... more Against the backdrop of an increasingly interconnected world as well as the growing role of inter-and supranational organizations, policy transfer has become a widespread phenomenon, not least in the realm of education. While policy transfer research has focused predominantly on isolated education sectors, less is known about the overall institutional conditions that favour or inhibit policy movement in different education sectors. We argue that the conditions for cross-border policy synthesis, as a central form of policy transfer, differ systematically between the two main education sectors preparing for labour market entry, namely higher education (HE) and vocational education and training (VET). Taking the case of the cross-border region of France, Germany and Switzerland as an example, the institutional analysis shows that demand-side, programmatic, contextual and application conditions are more favourable towards cross-border policy synthesis in HE than VET.
Regulation & Governance, 2021
This paper explores the extension of collective governance to sectors without collective governan... more This paper explores the extension of collective governance to sectors without collective governance tradition. We introduce the concept of state-led bricolage to analyze the expansion of the Swiss apprenticeship training systemin which employer associations fulfill core collective governance tasksto economic sectors in which training had previously followed a schoolbased and state-oriented logic. In deindustrializing societies, these sectors are key for the survival of collectively governed training systems. Through a mixed-methods analysis, we examine the reform process that led to the creation of new intermediary organizations that enable collective governance in these sectors. In addition, we compare the organizational features of these organizations with the respective organizations in the traditional crafts and industry sectors. We find that the new organizations result from state-led bricolage. They are hybrid organizations that reflect some of the bricoleur's core policy goals and critically build on the combination of associational and state-oriented institutional logics.
Comparative Education, 2021
This paper argues that country size can play a crucial role in shaping the type of gradual change... more This paper argues that country size can play a crucial role in shaping the type of gradual change observed in collective skill formation systems. Collectively governed dual-apprenticeship training has its base in the industrial and crafts sectors of the economy and builds on the decentralised cooperation of multiple public and private stakeholders. As a result, it tends to be strongly path dependent, which favours gradual over radical forms of change. However, in recent years, dual-apprenticeship training has been increasingly challenged by the rise of the knowledge and service economy and the growing popularity of academic forms of education. In this context, I compare policy responses in Switzerland and Germany, which represent one small and one large collective skill formation system, respectively. The historical-institutionalist analysis finds that the dominant trajectory of change is conversion in Switzerland but layering in Germany, with different implications for the future viability of collective skill formation.
Swiss Political Science Review, 2021
European cross‐border regions often display substantial political and economic activity. A key ex... more European cross‐border regions often display substantial political and economic activity. A key example is the French‐German‐Swiss Upper Rhine region, where three distinct national governance models come together. In this dynamic cross‐border industry cluster, traditional political‐administrative units often do not meet the functional needs of employers and (future) employees. This comparative institutional analysis refers to Varieties of Capitalism and Local Production Systems perspectives to explore the operations of this cluster. It finds two main patterns through which education and training are embedded in the cross‐border context: on the one hand, the leveraging of distinct institutional advantages in the different parts of the region and, on the other, the creation of cross‐border collective competition goods in the form of jointly provided educational institutions. Through these two strategies, local actors within the cross‐border industry cluster can turn their peripheral location into an institutional advantage.
New Interest Associations in a Neo‐Corporatist System: Adapting the Swiss Training System to the Service Economy
British Journal of Industrial Relations, 2020
Collective skill formation systems need to adapt to economic change, most notably the expansion o... more Collective skill formation systems need to adapt to economic change, most notably the expansion of the service economy. However, deeply anchored in the craft and industrial sectors, these systems rely on neo‐corporatist institutions to undergird firms’ training provision, which are often missing in the service sector. We show that Switzerland's voluntaristic approach to interest intermediation provided the flexibility needed to extend vocational training to economic sectors without neo‐corporatist institutions. Yet, these adaptations resulted in the emergence of interest associations characterised by low levels of generalisability and governability. These new associations co‐exist with neo‐corporatist ones, rendering the overall training system surprisingly heterogeneous.
Borders and cross-border labor markets: opportunities and challenges, 2020
The core argument of this paper is that Luxembourg’s location between the larger European nations... more The core argument of this paper is that Luxembourg’s location between the larger European nations of France and Germany is constitutive of skill development in this small state. On the one hand, Luxembourg continuously borrows educational models and principles from its two large(r) neighbors – which both represent major European models of skill formation. Thus, in Luxembourg’s skill formation system, elements from these two ‘big’ states get ‘mixed,’ although they are not necessarily complementary. On the other hand, Luxembourg compensates for its small size through impressive levels of cross-border activity with neighboring subnational regions in France, Germany, and Belgium – including in the cross-border provision of training. It does this through institutional bricolage and direct cooperation with neighboring countries – in this way significantly enlarging the scope and capacities of its national education system.
Empirical Research in Vocational Education and Training, 2020
Liberalization pressures challenge countries to adapt their training systems. This is particularl... more Liberalization pressures challenge countries to adapt their training systems. This is particularly relevant for coordinated market economies with firm-driven but collectively governed apprenticeship systems. Recent literature has identified different liberalization trajectories for these countries. For instance, segmentalism describes the increasing influence of large employers in Germany. In Denmark, state agencies manage increased flexibility in training through embedded flexibilization. In this paper, we identify a new form of embedded flexibilization, characterized by polite employer domination. We find this trajectory of liberalization in Switzerland, which represents another training system heavily based on firm involvement. We illustrate our argument with the example of short-track apprenticeship training, which has been expanded in all three mentioned countries in response to ongoing liberalization and deindustrialization pressures. In Switzerland, the relevant reform was initiated by the state while business adopted a rather passive role initially. Yet, state actors eventually stepped back and delegated key competences to employers, which implies that the employers’ camp asserted their interests in the end while tolerating some concessions for the benefit of disadvantaged groups. Our process tracing reveals that policy makers used layering to implement short-tracks that enhance social inclusion, while simultaneously increasing the scope of employer cooperation.
Torn between Economic Efficiency and Social Equality? Short-track Apprenticeships in Denmark, Germany, and Switzerland
European Educational Research Journal, 2019
Educational institutions, especially those facilitating vocational education and training (VET), ... more Educational institutions, especially those facilitating vocational education and training (VET), face the challenge of combining social goals, such as the provision of quality education for a large section of the population, with rising economic utility demands. However, we know little about how VET systems institutionalize these different demands and, further, how social and economic goals are actually institutionalized in VET. Our article aims to unpack this puzzle by analysing short-track dual vocational training programmes (short-tracks) in Denmark, Germany and Switzerland. These short-tracks combine on-the-job and school-based training, targeting candidates who face difficulties entering full-length dual programmes. Thus, short-tracks are prime examples of training programmes located at the nexus of economic and social demands. In our comparative institutional analysis, we bridge the political economy of collective skill formation and sociological institutionalism literatures. We find that the institutionalization of goals in VET not only differs between countries but that there is also considerable variation within national VET systems. Our analysis reveals that VET regulations, regional and sectoral standards, and the legitimization of key actors can differ greatly in their institutionalization of social and economic goals.
Di Maio, G./Graf, L./Wilson, A. (2019) Torn between Economic Efficiency and Social Equality? Short-track Apprenticeships in Denmark, Germany, and Switzerland. European Educational Research Journal. Advance access: https://doi.org/10.1177/1474904119869561
Social versus liberal collective skill formation systems? A comparative-historical analysis of the role of trade unions in German and Swiss VET
European Journal of Industrial Relations, 2019
We distinguish between social and liberal collective skill formation systems and demonstrate that... more We distinguish between social and liberal collective skill formation systems and demonstrate that the German VET system is a social system with a strong (parity) role for trade unions in its governance. In contrast, unions play a considerably weaker role in the more liberal Swiss system, which privileges employers’ interests. We show that the different position of unions in VET systems has the expected consequences on a range of indicators. We further examine why unions are less important in Switzerland and show how, after the First World War, differences in the institutional environment and power resources of the union movements set Germany and Switzerland on different paths, which are still visible today.
Emmenegger, P./Graf, L./Strebel, A. (2019). Social versus liberal collective skill formation systems? A comparative-historical analysis of the role of trade unions in German and Swiss VET. European Journal of Industrial Relations. Advance access: https://doi.org/10.1177/0959680119844426
The governance of decentralised cooperation in collective training systems: a review and conceptualisation
Journal of Vocational Education & Training, 2019
Collective training systems are based on the cooperation of multiple public and private stakehold... more Collective training systems are based on the cooperation of multiple public and private stakeholders in order to work. However, such cooperation is not self-sustaining and depends, for instance, on public policies, capable intermediary organisations and shared logics of action. In this conceptual paper, we first review the political economy literature on cooperation in collective skill formation and find that it has given insufficient attention to the systematic comparative analysis of cooperation at the decentralised level as well as the actual social practices of cooperation. The paper then develops a multidisciplinary analytical framework that allows future research to examine decentralised cooperation at the regional, sectoral and occupational levels more systematically. This framework is grounded in a synthesis of three strands of empirical research on vocational education and training, namely the comparative political economy literature on governance, corporatism and coordination, institutional labour and societal economics as well as the educational science literature.
Emmenegger, P./Graf, L./Trampusch, C. (2019) The Governance of Decentralised Cooperation in Collective Training Systems: A Review and Conceptualisation. Journal of Vocational Education & Training, 71(1): 21-45.
https://doi.org/10.1080/13636820.2018.1498906
Socio-Economic Review, 2018
The corporatist-governed dual-training system has been a key example of collective governance in ... more The corporatist-governed dual-training system has been a key example of collective governance in the German capitalist model. However, high-end dual-training is increasingly being offered within post-secondary higher education. Here, firms and universities, not chambers of commerce or trade unions, are the actors negotiating the curricula of and access to a range of 'dual-study programmes'. This article traces the emergence and expansion of this more firm-specific skills provision system, which diminishes the beneficial constraints for strategic cooperation and, in turn, the provision of collective training standards and transferable skills. The case study builds on the 'gradual institutional change' taxonomy, while pointing to the potential benefits of using different modes of change in combination. Through analysing firms' strategies to initiate change in an institutional grey area between established socioeconomic spheres, the article shows how layering, conversion and drift can become interlinked and how each individual process can trigger and feed the next.
Luxembourg exhibits strong transnational traits within its skills regime, defying any neat fit wi... more Luxembourg exhibits strong transnational traits within its skills regime, defying any neat fit with existing educational typologies. It is characterised by its high-skill economy, cross-cultural characteristics, and central location within the European Union. As such, Luxembourg has developed a hybrid strategy of responding to labour market challenges, and by that, to skills development. Our institutionalist analysis finds that Luxembourg is involved in transnational skills development in three complementary ways: (a) employers in Luxembourg extensively recruit skilled workers at the European and global levels, but also (b) heavily rely on the distinct skills sets of cross-border commuters from the neighbouring regions of Belgium, France, and Germany (the Greater Region). Furthermore, (c) Luxembourg combines institutional elements of these neighbouring countries – representing distinct models of capitalism and welfare – within its own education system. In combining the specific strengths of different national skills regimes, institutional bricolage represents a core feature of Luxembourg’s highly stratified system of skill formation. Our analytical framework refers to two major comparative political economy perspectives, namely the welfare state and varieties of capitalism approaches, to analyse how Luxembourg has responded to deindustrialisation by creating a domestic transnational labour market.
Graf, L. & Gardin, M. (2018) Transnational skills development in post-industrial knowledge economies: the case of Luxembourg and the Greater Region. Journal of Education and Work, 31(1): 1-15.
https://doi.org/10.1080/13639080.2017.1408954
In both Germany and the United States, employers search for new strategies to recruit and train p... more In both Germany and the United States, employers search for new strategies to recruit and train people in times of a dynamically evolving economy and rising educational expectations on the part of individuals. In this context, we observe the proliferation of work-based higher education programmes in both countries. This development challenges the common classification found in the political economy and educational policy literature that distinguishes between collectively governed dual apprenticeships in Germany and market-driven on-the-job training in the US. The paper proposes an alternative conceptualization that identifies significant similarities in the governance mode of work-based higher education across the two countries. Based on expert interviews and document analysis, the institutional analysis focuses on complex multi-actor governance constellations at the nexus of vocational training and higher education and explores consequences for contemporary policy-making in advanced skill formation.
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Monographs by Lukas Graf
Banscherus, U., Bernhard, N., & Graf, L. (2016). Durchlässigkeit als mehrdimensionale Aufgabe. Bedingungen für flexible Bildungsübergänge. Berlin: Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung.
Journal articles by Lukas Graf
Di Maio, G./Graf, L./Wilson, A. (2019) Torn between Economic Efficiency and Social Equality? Short-track Apprenticeships in Denmark, Germany, and Switzerland. European Educational Research Journal. Advance access: https://doi.org/10.1177/1474904119869561
Emmenegger, P./Graf, L./Strebel, A. (2019). Social versus liberal collective skill formation systems? A comparative-historical analysis of the role of trade unions in German and Swiss VET. European Journal of Industrial Relations. Advance access: https://doi.org/10.1177/0959680119844426
Emmenegger, P./Graf, L./Trampusch, C. (2019) The Governance of Decentralised Cooperation in Collective Training Systems: A Review and Conceptualisation. Journal of Vocational Education & Training, 71(1): 21-45.
https://doi.org/10.1080/13636820.2018.1498906
Graf, L. & Gardin, M. (2018) Transnational skills development in post-industrial knowledge economies: the case of Luxembourg and the Greater Region. Journal of Education and Work, 31(1): 1-15.
https://doi.org/10.1080/13639080.2017.1408954