Public Defence: Carolina Dahle

Carolina Dahle will defend her PhD degree in humanities, cultural and educational sciences. The dissertation shows how different forms of governing inclusive education in Germany and Norway shape school leaders’ autonomy.

13 Nov

Practical information

  • Date: 13 November 2025
  • Time: 10.00 - 15.00
  • Location: Vestfold, Campus Vestfold, A1-30 Larvik og Zoom
  • Download calendar file

    • Link to digital participation (Zoom)

    Programme

    10:00-10:45 Trial lecture: How are legal (normative) and cultural-cognitive factors connected in implementing inclusive education and shaping the role of special education, viewed comparatively between Norway and Germany and over time?
    12:00 Public defence

    Assessment committee

    • First opponent: Professor Vera Moser, Goethe University Frankfurt
    • Second opponent: Associate Professor  Fred Carlo Andersen, OsloMet
    • Administrator: Mette Bunting, University of South-Eastern Norway

    Supervisors

    • Main supervisor: Professor Tine Sophie Prøitz, University of South-Eastern Norway
    • Co-supervisor: Professor Guri Skedsmo, Schwyz University of Teacher Education
       

    Public defence host: Professor Heike Speitz, University of South-Eastern Norway

Any questions?

Carolina Dahle is defending her dissertation for the degree philosophiae doctor (PhD) at the University of South-Eastern Norway.smilende kvinne med mørkt hår og briller på grønn bakgrunn

 

The doctoral work has been carried out at the Faculty of Humanities, Sports, and Educational Science.

You are invited to follow the trial lecture and the public defence.

Summary

School leaders in both Norway and Germany face similar expectations: they are expected to lead inclusive school development, promote collaboration, and ensure quality, often without having full decision-making authority. In this context, autonomy is seen as significant for decision-making and the ability to respond to local needs. Yet, research shows that school leaders operate within systems that both enable and constrain their scope for action.

This dissertation demonstrates that autonomy is not a given but shaped within complex governing structures. By comparing Germany and Norway, the study reveals how different forms of governing inclusive education shape school leaders’ autonomy and why these matters for both policy and practice.

The results show that school leaders in Norway work within a coherent legal framework but experience regulatory pressure. In Germany, fragmented governing leads to unclear responsibilities and limited decision-making power. Autonomy cannot therefore be understood as independence, but rather as a dynamic process shaped by laws, policies, local contexts, and, not least, by the individual school leader.

For policy and practice, this means that reform initiatives promising greater autonomy must consider how different forms of governing affect leadership in practice. Without such understanding, efforts to strengthen inclusion risk assigning responsibility without real decision-making authority. The dissertation contributes new empirical insights and a perspective on autonomy as a process that is both context-dependent and shaped. This underscores the need for more coherent governing that supports school leaders in balancing autonomy and accountability.