The Fatal Conceit: Swedish Education after Nazism

Gabriel Heller Sahlgren () and Johan Wennström
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Gabriel Heller Sahlgren: Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN), Postal: Research Institute of Industrial Economics, Box 55665, SE-102 15 Stockholm, Sweden, https://www.ifn.se/en/researchers/affiliated-researchers/gabriel-heller-sahlgren/
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: Gabriel Heller-Sahlgren

No 1338, Working Paper Series from Research Institute of Industrial Economics

Abstract: In the aftermath of the Second World War, Sweden dismantled an education system that was strongly influenced by German, Neo-Humanist pedagogical principles in favor of a progressive, student-centered system. This article suggests this was in large part due to a fatal misinterpretation of the education policy on which Nazism was predicated. Contrary to scholarly and popular belief, Nazi schools were not characterized by discipline and run top-down by teachers. In fact, the Nazis encouraged a nationwide youth rebellion in schools. Many Nazi leaders had themselves experienced the belligerent, child-centered war pedagogy of 1914–1918 rather than a traditional German education. Yet, Swedish school reformers came to regard Neo-Humanism as a fulcrum of the Third Reich. The article suggests this mistake paved the way for a school system that inadvertently came to share certain traits with the true educational credo of Nazism and likely contributed to Sweden’s recent educational decline.

Keywords: National Socialism; Neo-Humanism; Progressivism; Sweden; War pedagogy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D70 E65 I20 I28 N44 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 41 pages
Date: 2020-05-14
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-his and nep-mac
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