This paper describes the study which attempts to determine if civic education and political socialization topics are international in scope and, moreover, if instruments can be designed to measure cross-national effects of such education. An international committee first meeting in Hamburg, Germany, in 1966, decided to treat the subject conceptually in terms of universalities. National Centers were asked to supply information to 20 basic questions regarding the major goals of civic education. After receiving replies from these centers the international committee met to determine which curriculum elements were of common importance cross-nationally. Cognitive test specifications were designed to measure three different levels of population education and of abstractions. 1500 cognitive items, clarified by content, topic, and abstraction level, were developed for use at three educational levels. Following the identification of certain common areas of political processes through the systematic content analysis of national materials in the area, various types of student attitudinal measures were developed as a result of the IEA dry runs. Several hundred questions will be measured during 1972 through analysis of data and the results published sometime in 1973. (Author/SJM)