This paper addresses the issue of how local and global norms and requirements are negotiated in the early stages of development of Social Science research ethics policy in a Global South context. A review of relevant literature followed by analysis of relevant national and institutional policies highlights both tensions and creative potential for…

The paper offers a critical appraisal of the global knowledge developments in education using China's contributions in a fashion similar to a case study. The paper scrutinizes the complicity of Western educational research to euro-centric biases and discusses the pursuit of a global epistemological eclecticism. To support this claim, the magnitude…

Drawing on the recent critiques of the global knowledge economy of social science research, this article explores possible ways in which the Japanese education research communities can reposition themselves in the wider international education research community. The premises of this discussion are that there exists a global structure of academic…

The last decades have seen the completion of an increasing number of qualitative comparative research projects on teaching. Challenges and benefits which might arise from a qualitative international comparative research design have been considered. However, very little has been published on challenges and benefits which may arise from using…

This study examines the ways in which different research perspectives have tended to problematize global university rankings (GURs). An analytical framework is applied to help articulate four distinct research discourses that have been applied to GURs. The framework distinguishes research problems which are locally defined and "emergent" from…

This article discusses the role of the hybrid field of law education and its status in South Africa. The authors suggest that, in their consideration of education law, it should be understood as the particular collection of legal rules that regulate all activities and relationships in education. These legal rules as applied in education are…

This paper describes a component of a larger cross-national comparative study on faculty development for teaching international students. Here we describe the study and report preliminary findings that offer analyses of the informal and formal means by which Italian and US university instructors enhance the knowledge and skills they find necessary…

Higher education had a predominant national and institutional focus for a long time. In Europe, supra-national political activities played a major role for increasing the interest in comparative research. Comparative perspectives are important in order to deconstruct the often national perspective of causal reasoning, for proving benchmarks, for…

The problem of professional training of teachers in foreign countries in terms of intercultural interaction of educational space objects has been studied in the paper. It has been stated that the current stage of human civilization development which is defined as the transition to a knowledge society, is characterized by qualitatively new…

To view giftedness research in a global context is an important and desirable attempt. Roland S. Persson (2012a), in the target article entitled Cultural Variation and Dominance in a Globalised Knowledge-Economy: Towards a Cultural-Sensitive Research Paradigm in the Science of Giftedness, delivers thought-provoking views in the cultural influences…

Persson's (2012a) article offers a timely contribution to the science of giftedness through questioning the validity of research emerging from within this paradigm. Using evidence from a number of disciplines he demonstrates that what is regarded as gifted behaviour in one culture could be regarded as quite ordinary within another. He therefore…

In this commentary, the author finds the interdisciplinary approach of Roland S. Persson's (2012a) target article refreshing. Persson's (2012a) additional emphases on ethnocentricity, cultural bias and strong threads of influence from the global economy also are helpful. They shed light on some strong contextual influences that shape the…

Roland S. Persson's (2012a) argument is that there is a dominant research culture in the field of gifts and talents, which must of necessity distort research and practice in cultures which are different. He ties this to the dominance of the global economy and points to the need for more cross-cultural studies. In this commentary, the author points…

The objective of this target article is to chart the potential threat to research validity in the field of giftedness research, and by implication also the study and practice of gifted education, in the light of cultural bias. It endeavours to pull together facts from a number of academic disciplines to make sense of how culture relates to…

Our rapidly-changing, ambiguous, global business arena demands a unique and evolving set of insights and capabilities by which leaders may effectively navigate this new terrain. Mentoring can accomplish exactly that, as its processes orient, train, and advance the skills, knowledge, and experiences of aspiring leaders. Best utilized, mentoring is…