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Exclusive and inclusive discourses in special education research and policy in Sweden

An overview is provided about how special education in Sweden was developed and established as an educational discourse following three different lines. The first was ideological/political, particularly with emphasis on party-political unity. The second was focused on research, while the third was related to practice. It is argued that this development could be described as incremental, consensualistic, technocratic and participatory. These four phases have exerted a strong influence on special education research which by tradition has taken to a low degree the learning environment into account when describing students' difficulties. With reference to a recently finished research survey, it is shown that this epistemologically narrow perspective still dominates special education research in Sweden. A model using two ideal-typical approaches (categorical versus relational) is introduced to map out, categorize and describe ongoing and recently finished research. It is concluded that the relational perspective gains ground even if some of the research within the relational perspective has its roots within the categorical perspective. Sometimes it seems as if this is a kind of ‘add-on’ to the individual-based research. The analyses indicate some kind of internal isolation within the two perspectives, a situation that calls for more of a dialogue and open debate.