Sweden has been regarded as a “model country” when it comes to the system of early childhood education as the system has historically combined educational purposes and care within the framework of one institution (Tallberg Broman, 1995). The perception of the child as a societal actor for change has been prominent in Swedish preschool policy since the 1930’s. With the breakthrough of the sociology of childhood and critical pedagogies in the research field in the 1980’s, this idea was revived in the rhetoric of “the competent child”. A concept now well known, and used, in both national education policy and educational practice (Lindgren, 2018). During the last two decades the Swedish educational system has undergone changes -following trends in transnational education policy heavily influenced by economic oriented organizations such as the OECD (Pettersson, Prøitz & Forsberg, 2017). In order to address the “precarious times” and “crisis” highlighted in, for example, the OECD’s Starting Strong reports (e g 2015; 2017), the young child is emphasized as a rather unexploited resource in need of specific educational intervention. Furthermore, early childhood education is not only described as an important investment in trying to control the outcome of the future, but is seen as the mean through which the child – vulnerable and at risk due to her/his socio-economic conditions - is to be freed from deep-rooted problems such as poverty and limited life opportunities (Mahon, 2016). In this study we have analyzed national and transnational early education policy (such as Swedish curriculum support documents and OECD’s Starting Strong reports) using Bacchi’s (2012) policy analytical model WPR. In our analysis, we have found that the merging of the seemingly contrasting images of the “competent” and “vulnerable” child, both underpinning one another in the Swedish early childhood education discourse, strengthens the idea of the preschool child as being a suitable subject for - and in need of - intervention. Consequently serving as legitimacy to increase the expectations and demands for results of early education.

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