In 1972 the Württembergische Verwaltungs- und Wirtschafts-Akademie (VWA) and the IHK Stuttgart cooperated closely on the initiative of large firms – such as Robert Bosch GmbH, Daimler Benz AG, and Standard Elek- trik Lorenz AG (Kramer, 1981: 19) – to create the first vocational academies and, with that, the prototype of dual study programs (Beschoner, 2009: 13). The so-called “Stuttgarter Modell” was an ausbildungsintegrierendes dual study program (Kramer, 1981: 20) and helped firms to attract persons with an Abitur (i.e., with general academic skills) to embark on vocationally specific training. The vocational academies introduced a new structural element to tertiary education (Deißinger, 2000: 611), signifying a trend towards educa- tional modes that combine practical and intellectual skills (see, e.g., Sorge, 2007: 240).
The founding of the first vocational academies is closely linked to the es- tablishment of the universities of applied sciences (1969–1972). The univer- sities of applied sciences were created through an “upgrading” of technical and engineering schools (Metzner, 1997) in order to account for increased demand in tertiary education and also to improve the international reputation of the training provided by these organizations (BMBF, 2004: 6). In fact, both of these arguments had gained in popularity in the late 1960s as they have been voiced by students of these former technical and engineering
84 In addition, it can be noted that the German dual study programs tend to differ significantly from the more loosely organized on-the-job apprenticeships that are sometimes offered as part of university programs in liberal market economies (see also Chapter 2).
schools themselves (Kahlert, 2006). Ironically, the vocational academies can in large part be seen as an unintended consequence of this upgrading of the former engineering schools: Influential large firms in Baden-Württemberg launched them precisely in order to secure their hold on high-end VET, which they feared they would lose in the face of the greater autonomy of the new universities of applied sciences (Kahlert, 2006). In other words, the vocational academies were in part founded because industry feared the in- creasing academization linked to the upgrading of the former technical and engineering schools into universities of applied sciences (Schwiedrzik, 2001: 164). In addition, in the aftermath of the mass student protests of 1968, these firms were skeptical of the capacity of these new universities of applied sciences to produce “loyal employees” (Hillmert and Kröhnert, 2003: 199).
I characterize the genesis of the first dual study programs as a bottom-up process that was, in the first place, driven by the interests of large firms. The large firms did not have sufficient influence within the organizational field of HE – which in Germany is traditionally dominated by “political legalism” (Goldschmidt, 1991), the “academic oligarchy” (Clark, 1983), and the Bild- ungsbürgertum (middle-class intellectuals) – to directly intervene in the process of upgrading of the engineering and technical schools into universi- ties of applied sciences. Thus, as an alternative strategy, they opted to estab- lish a new organizational form that specifically caters for their needs. In this sense, the firms resemble the type of change agents that Mahoney and Thelen (2010b: 25–26) describe as subversives. However, they neither sought to entirely displace the newly established universities of applied sciences nor the dual apprenticeship programs, but aimed to establish a new organizational form at the fringes of these two established ones. At the system level, this process of genesis can be seen as historically contingent. For instance, as Kahlert (2006) notes, the vocational academies were not mentioned in any general education policy plan; their genesis rather happened as a by-product of the politically planned creation of the universities of applied sciences. As one of the interviewees said, in the beginning the vocational academies were not taken seriously by most of the established actors in the fields of VET and HE; they were rather seen as a thought experiment (Interview DE3).
With reference to the theoretical framework developed in Chapter 3, the emergence of the vocational academies can be interpreted as resulting from the conversion and blending of institutional elements taken from dual appren- ticeship training with characteristic HE elements. For example, dual study programs were at the forefront of a development through which the practice- oriented competences approach (handlungskompetenzorientierter Ansatz) is brought to bear on HE (Interview DE3). This is seen by some interviewees as an upward orientation – or as a diffusion of the VET principle to HE (Inter- view DE2) – but without losing sight of the specific strength of the dual principle (Interview DE5). In this way, a new hybrid organizational form was
created that represents a layer located in a grey area between VET and HE (see Hybridization Hypothesis and Genesis Scenario II).85 This genesis of the dual study programs represents an “unintended” bottom-up process triggered by the subversive activities of large industrial firms in Baden-Württemberg. The largely efficiency-driven interest of firms in practically oriented dual study programs coincided with the interests of a specific target group of students (see also Section 6.3.2 below). Thus, the genesis of vocational academies carries a strong moment of contingency.
Before the analysis delves into the further evolution of dual study pro- grams (Phase II), the next section offers an account of the relationship be- tween VET and HE in the German Democratic Republic. This short detour serves to further specify some of the essential conditions behind the genesis of dual study programs in the Federal Republic of Germany.
A Short Detour: The Different Relationship between VET and HE in the German Democratic Republic (1949–1990)
This book focuses on relevant historical developments in the Federal Repub- lic of Germany (Bundesrepublik Deutschland, FRG). However, Germany was divided into two countries for some of the time-span covered here. In this section I offer a short overview of the distinct characteristics of the relationship between VET and HE in the German Democratic Republic (Deutsche Demokratische Republik, GDR) (1949–1990), as it helps to con- textualize the particularity of the genesis of the dual study programs in the FRG. To begin with, I provide some information on the general institutional set-up of the education system in the GDR in relation to that in the FRG.
After World War II educational policy in the GDR was strongly influ- enced by Marxist-Leninist ideology and took the Soviet Union as its role model (Baske, 1998). In contrast, in the FRG the guiding idea was to re- establish the traditional path of German educational policy prior to 1933 (Below, 2002: 82). In the GDR the education system was built on the idea of the existence of an objective law of societal development, while in the FRG it was based on the norm of the individual’s pursuit of his or her own ideals and interests (Lenhardt and Stock, 2000: 520). Correspondingly, in the GDR the education system and the job “market” were more tightly coupled than in the FRG case (Köhler and Stock, 2004: 97). In addition, the education system in the former was premised on centralized governance as opposed to federalist governance in the latter (see Anweiler, 1990: 12). In 1950 the GDR joined the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (Comecon),86 which institution- 85 Table 34 (see Appendix 11.5.1) provides a tabular overview of the main hypotheses and
scenarios.
86 The Comecon was established in 1949 by the Soviet Union, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia (more countries joined later on). The goal of the Comecon was to create a systematic division of labor between the socialist states and also to promote
alized regular meetings between the ministers responsible for education.87 According to Dobbins (2009: 403), the institutional fabric in the sphere of influence of the Soviet Union was based on state interventionism and egali- tarian values. However, it is crucial to note that despite such egalitarian norms the GDR turned increasingly into a class-based society (see Solga, 1996).
The fact that the GDR was a satellite state of the Soviet Union had sub- stantial consequences for its education system, especially considering the important role of polytechnically-oriented education implemented during the Sovietization process (see Köhler and Stock, 2004: 29). Beginning with the restructuring of the education system in the GDR after World War II, signifi- cant changes were introduced that directly affected the institutional relation- ship between VET and HE in the GDR. One example is the abolishment of the tiered school system up to the tenth grade and the creation of the so-called zehnklassige allgemeinbildende polytechnische Oberschule, which integrated polytechnical elements into the curricula of general academic education. Another example is the existence of a three-year program from grade 11 to 13 that combined VET with a general university entrance certificate (Berufsaus- bildung mit Abitur) (e.g., Schäfer, 1990). VET also played an important role in the dominant cultural-cognitive model of skill formation. For instance, Köhler (2004) notes that the skilled worker (Facharbeiter) was the guiding model in education policy in the 1970s.
Thus, the relationship between VET and HE was configured in different ways in the GDR and the FRG. At first glance, the above seems to point to greater institutional permeability between VET and academic education in the GDR compared to the situation in the FRG. However, in the GDR the level of social mobility that was actually realized was limited in several other significant ways (see Solga, 1996). For instance, members of the party elite did not refrain from using their monopoly in regulating access to – and the expansion of – educational programs to reproduce their own social class. Nevertheless, after reunification some of the organizational forms in the GDR that helped to provide institutional permeability between VET and HE, like Berufsausbildung mit Abitur, could have served as a source of innovation to overcome the more rigid divide between these two fields in the FRG. How- ever, institutional transfer after reunification mostly took place from western Germany to eastern Germany. Thus, for example, the dual vocational training system was transferred from West to East (Culpepper, 1999a: 269–270; see also Wagner, 1999). At the same time, some of the organizational forms
harmonization in the context of disparate economic conditions (Encyclopædia Britannica, 2012).
87 An example of an outcome of this cooperation is the convention on the recognition of educational and academic degrees that was agreed on in Prague in 1972 to enhance cross- border labor mobility (Kuebart, 1990: 666–668).
established in the GDR, such as the double qualification of Abitur and skilled worker’s certificate, were abolished. Trade unions and social democrats would have liked to preserve this Berufsausbildung mit Abitur, but this was first opposed by the chambers and, subsequently, also by the Federal Minis- try of Education and Research (Busemeyer, 2009d: 131; Berger, 1995). Speaking about institutional transfer from western to eastern Germany more broadly, Streeck (2009: 212) argues that it was intended to stabilize the status quo in western Germany. Interestingly, the functioning of several of these transferred institutions had already been called into question in western Germany prior to their transfer to eastern Germany (see also Diewald, Goedicke, and Solga, 2000). However, western Germany did not see reunifi- cation as a catalyst for reform in the relationship between VET and HE.88
This historical excursion shows that the GDR did not offer conditions that were conducive to the genesis of the hybrid dual study programs, which in the FRG included the self-initiative of industrial firms, corporatist-style market coordination, and a state with some degree of laissez-faire attitude.89 Moving on from a discussion of the conditions for the genesis of dual study programs, the next section describes the further evolution of these programs from the 1970s to the present.
6.3.2 Phase II (Further Evolution): The Rise of Dual Studies and the