The Creation of New International Networks in Education: The League of Nations and Educational Organizations in the 1920s

Abstract

There is hardly any doubt that the First World War interrupted most of the international educational relations that had reached their peak in the two decades before the outbreak of the war. In virtually all areas of education – the educational system, educational science, teaching and learning, child welfare, and the educational professions – international organizations and congresses had been established at this time. Exhibitions at world’s fairs attracted numerous educators and teachers; an intensive international exchange of students and teachers led to mutual communication and cooperation. Nevertheless, the growth of these international educational relations was lacking a central body for the coordination of all these activities and for making them more effective. Various attempts in Europe and the US to found an international bureau of education since the 1870s had been unsuccessful, and the beginning of the war in 1914 seemed to nullify these institutionalized forms of international collaboration and well‐established networks. However, the war did not tear them apart. Many of the projects of the prewar period were reestablished, as were international organizations and congresses. But in contrast to its earlier phase, the internationalization process in the 1920s became much more institutionalized, and the previously existing networks that had been rather weak now found an organizational basis for their – in many cases very similar – efforts and goals.

Notes

¹ A much more detailed account of the educational politics of the League of Nations can be found in my forthcoming book, Die internationale edukative Bewegung. Studien zu Austausch‐ und Transferprozessen im Aufbruch der Moderne. Stuttgart: Steiner, 2008.

² See Depaepe, Marc. “Soziale Abnormität und moralische Debilität bei Kindern. Ein Diskussionsthema auf internationalen wissenschaftlichen Zusammenkünften am Anfang dieses Jahrhunderts.” Paedagogica Historica 26, no. 2 (1990): 185–209; Bourdieu, Pierre. “Les conditions sociales de la circulation internationale des idées.” Romanistische Zeitschrift für Literaturgeschichte 4 (1990): 1–12.

³ On the prewar activities see Fuchs, Eckhardt. “Educational Sciences, Morality and Politics: International Educational Congresses in the Early Twentieth Century.” Paedagogica Historica 40, no. 6 (2004): 757–84.

⁴ See among others Newman, M. E. J. “The Structure of Scientific Collaboration Networks.” PNAS 98, no. 2 (2001): 404–9; Watts, Duncan J. Six Degrees. The Science of a Connected Age. New York–London: Norton, 2003.

⁵ Watts, Duncan J. Small Worlds. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999.

⁶ Barabási, Albert‐László. Linked: How Everything is Connected to Everything Else and What it Means for Business, Science, and Everyday Life. Cambridge, MA: Perseus, 2002.

⁷ Cf. Rosselló, Pedro. Forerunners of the International Bureau of Education: A Hitherto Unrecorded Aspect of the History of Education and of International Institutions. London: Evans Bros, [1944]: 49; Fern Andrews, Fannie. “Education at the Peace Conference.” School and Society 10 (1919): 105.

⁸ Quoted in Davies, Gwylm. Intellectual Co‐operation Between the two Wars. London: Council for Education in World Citizenship, [1943]: 12.

⁹ See Miller, Carol. “The Social Section and Advisory Committees on Social Questions of the League of Nations.” In International Health Organisations and Movements, 1918–1939, edited by Paul Weindling. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995: 154–75, here: 155ff.; League of Nations. International Association for the Promotion of Child Welfare. Report by M. Quiñones de León adopted by the Council on 13 September 1922. Cfr. Bundesarchiv Berlin, R 901, Nr. 32857.

¹⁰ Société des Nations. Rapport du Comité Spécial d’Experts sur la Traite des Femmes et des Enfants. Deuxième Partie, 17 février 1927 (C.52.1927.IV).

¹¹ “The League of Nations and International Association for the Protection of Children.” School and Society 21 (1925): 82–83; Fifth Assembly of the League of Nations. Protection of Children. Resolution adopted by the Assembly at its meeting held on Friday, September 26^th, 1924 (afternoon). Adopted on the Report of the Fifth Committee (A127.1924.IV); Rooke, Patricia T., and Rudy L. Schnell. “‘Uncramping Child Life’: International Children’s Organisations, 1914–1939.” In: Weindling, International Health Organisations, 176–202, here: 190f.

¹² Dalmace Saget, R. P. “Le Mouvement ‘Secouriste’ ou l’Union internationale des secours aux enfants.” Etudes sociales 30 (1931): 1–23.

¹³ See Fifth Assembly of the League of Nations. Protection of Children. Resolution adopted by the Assembly at its meeting held on Friday, September 26^th, 1924 (afternoon). Adopted on the Report of the Fifth Committee (A127.1924.IV).

¹⁴ Premier Congrès Général de L’Enfant. Genève, 24–28 août 1925. Voeux et Résolutions. Genève: L’Union Internationale de Secours aux Enfants, 1925; “The International Child Welfare Congress at Geneva.” School and Society 21 (1925): 674–5.

¹⁵ See Zehn Jahre Internationale Arbeitsorganisation. Mit einem Vorwort von Albert Thomas. Genf: Internationales Arbeitsamt, 1931.

¹⁶ See School Text‐Book Revision and International Understanding. Paris: International Institute of Intellectual Cooperation, 1933: 10, 133ff.; Kolasa, Jan. International Intellectual Cooperation (The League Experience and the Beginnings of UNESCO). Wroclaw: Zakład narodowy im. Ossolińskich, 1962: 68f.

¹⁷ School Text‐Book Revision, 13f.

¹⁸ Conférence Internationale pour l’Enseignement de l’Histoire—Réunion préparatoire des 1er et 2 février 1932. Paris: Les Presses Universitaires de France, 1932.

¹⁹ Northedge, F. S. “International Intellectual Co‐operation Within the League of Nations. Its Conceptual Basis and Lessons for the Present.” Ph.D. thesis, London University, 1953: 618ff.; Hermon, Elly. “Le désarmement moral en tant que facteur dans les relations internationales pendant l’entre‐deux‐guerres.” Historical Papers. Journal of the Canadian Historical Association (1987): 198–211.

²⁰ Le Comité d’Entente des grandes Associations Internationales. Dix Années d’Activité. Paris: Union, 1936; Hermon, Elly. “Le Comité d’entente des grandes associations internationales. Un chapitre de l’histoire du mouvement transnational d’éducation pour la paix et la coopération intellectuelle internationale.” Associations Transnationales (1987): 68–78, 208–17.