There are few thematizations of inclusive education in international comparative research that do not refer directly or indirectly to culture: be it society as a cultural entity, questions of inclusion in schools being embedded in cultural, political and social conditions, or culture being the explicit framing of an overarching regional context. There is a long tradition of raising cultural questions in the discourse on inclusive education. It is surprising, then, that in the discourse and practice of comparative research on inclusive education, culture as a comparative entity has so far rarely been explicitly picked up on as a methodological issue. Moreover, questions of using and dealing with categories (e.g. dis/ability) against the background of cultural differences and commonalities have received little attention.
METHODS: In this article, we take this as an opportunity to explore methodological challenges in cross-cultural comparison. By mapping different understandings of culture, we describe cross-cultural comparison as a methodological approach. This aims to elaborate on ambivalences in cross-cultural comparison in the field of inclusive education. To illustrate these, we present examples from an exploratory scoping review of how culture is articulated in inclusion-related journals, before offering considerations for methodological approaches in cross-cultural inclusion research.
RESULTS: Based on an analytical grid, certain formations of how culture is articulated in relation to inclusive education could be identified: (a) culture as a national reference; (b) culture as a cultural-historical process and practice; (c) culture as a group; (d) culture as a system of production and representation.
CONCLUSION: With regards to the presented formations, it is noticeable that national references remain an important and yet rather static entity of comparison, despite inclusion/exclusion being a complex and dynamic phenomenon. Furthermore, disabilities play a specific role within the discourse on inclusive education in cultural comparison.