Comparative research on the formation of VET models has often claimed that industrialization processes and the transition from craft based to industrial production has a decisive role in explaining national variations (Hall & Socksice 2001; Thelen 2004). Other studies hold that the significant game changer phase could be identified in the aftermath of the second world, focusing the interaction between partisan politics and socio-economic structures (Busemeyer 2014). The argument is that initial patterns establish no path which limits later options for change. This represents significant theoretical challenges for conceptualising such processes in terms of historical institutionalism, which often relies on relatively strong versions of path dependency. In Norway, the ascent of the Labour to power in 1935, no doubt marked a turning point in the direction of stronger state commitment to vocational education and training (Michelsen & Olsen & Høst 2014. The social democrats governed with a majority in the parliament for almost three decades. However, the VET model developed in this period, is not a typical social democratic model, but has strong liberal traits. In this paper we investigate the configuration of actors and conditions in order to discuss what may explain the development of the Norwegian hybrid model of VET.

Busemeyer, M. R. (2014). Skills and inequality: partisan politics and the political economy of education reforms in Western welfare states. Cambridge University Press. Busemeyer, Marius R and Trampusch, Christine (2012) The Political Economy of Skill Formation. Oxford University Press: Oxford. Hall, Peter H and Davis Socksice (2001) Varieties of Capitalism. The Institutional Foundations of Comparative advantage. Oxford University press: Oxford Michelsen, Svein & Ole Johnny Olsen & Håkon Høst 2014. Origins and development of VET 1850- 2008 - an investigation into the Norwegian case. Research report. http://nord-vet.dk/