The paper outlines objectives and theoretical and methodological contexts of a research project on Educational research in Europe. After a short overview of the state of the art about comparative research on educational research it firstly suggests to draw a map of Educational research in Europe based on common organsiational structures and thematical/methodological fields. It, secondly, suggests an empirical approach to validate (and modify) the proposed map of educational research commonalities in Europe. Thirdly, it emphasizes the importance of differences, frictions and diversities, in order to identify and analyse national and cultural particularities and to understand these particularities against the background of historical developments. Fourthly, it suggests to analyse selected educational topics of current public interest in order to investigate the complex interplay of international and interdisciplinary perspectives. In presenting such a research design the paper also intends to contribute to a revitalisation of comparative education as an scholarly network within EERA. The project will use social science methods, e.g. questionaires, content analysis, analysis of documents, which are of methodological use for an empirical, historical and comparative investigation. The paper will present the research design, show the fruitfulness and performanc of such an approach by examples, and will learn from discussion in order to improve and differentiate the design. The outcome would be, I hope, to contribute to a theoretical and methodical instument to better understand ourself, our institutions and our modes of thinking as educational researchers in a culturally and thematically diverse field of Educational Research in Europe, and, therefore, contribute to a European Educational Research Area. EERJ