The paper reports on and discusses the results from a comparative policy study that examined how matters of children’s rights in relation to education are constructed in two countries, Sweden and New Zealand. The analysis departs from the basic assumption that political strategies concerning the rights of the child take form in the meeting between universal rights claims from international conventions, and the particularisation of rights that is necessary when they are put into practice in a society. In this meeting, claims and expectations drawing on universality is confronted with claims and expectations that originate from contextually specific circumstances. The aim of the study was to examine this transition from universality to particularity of how children’s rights issues in education are comprehended. . A comparison between Sweden and New Zealand is especially interesting since the two countries are alike in many respects; both are Western democracies with wide welfare systems including well renowned education systems. Both nations are economically and politically stable, and the average standard of living is high. The question is whether these essential similarities make a up an enough common ground for interpreting children's rights in education in a similar way? However, there are also significant differences between the two nations; the most important is New Zealand’s large group (about a fifth of the population, and increasing) of Maori people that holds the status of indigenous people. People of European descent and of Maori descent togheter form a predominantely bi-cultural country. Sweden does not have an equivalent group of people, instead the situation in Sweden may be characterised as multicultural, with one clearly dominant culture. The colonial historical background of New Zealand also differs from the Swedish history, and so do educational and cultural traditions. How do these differences affect how children's rights issues in education are constructed? The analysis is theoretically framed within theory of rights, and the analysis and discussion draws on central concepts of human rights; civil, political and social rights. Rights for children, and especially rights in relation to education, are thereby elaborated on from a somewhat different perspective than most commonly done in research about children's rights in relation to education.

The study was undertaken through text analysis of central policy documents in the two countries, spanning from the mid 1990’s to 2008. This includes official reports, governemt bills, national strategies and the national periodic reports to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child. Texts from national agencies have also been part of the material.

The results are expected to expand our knowledge of how culture and context affect or even determine what is seen as the important children’s rights issues in education, and how universal claims 'survive' or not in actual national policy. The results of the stydy show that the impact from cultural and other contextual circumstances is clearly visible in how children’s rights issues in relation to education is understood and constructed in policy. Some matters are put forward in a similar way in both countries as important rights questions for children in education. Other issues seem the same, but a closer examination shows significant differences in how they are comprehended. Yet other matters are represented in only one of the countries, not being defined as a question of children's rights in relation to education in the other.