The German school system is still characterised not only by strong hierarchies within the general education system, but also by a sharp distinction between general and special education. In the 1960s, in the context of educational reform in West Germany, the special education school system was not integrated but expanded and differentiated (Powell 2016). This exclusion of pupils was mainly justified by the need to respond on social demands by protecting others in their achievement and development. Thus, certain pupils were constructed as a risk to the community and to economic progress. This paper will investigate two strands of this debate about in- and exclusion in education: (1) the discursive legitimisation of a new type of special school for ‘Gemeinschaftsschwierige’ [pupils who are difficult for the community], and (2) the debates on the necessary support for ‘Lernbehinderte’ [pupils with learning disabilities]. (1) By analysing debates on the new type of special schools for ‘Gemeinschaftsschwierige’, this contribution intends to shed light on the discursive construction of the pupils targeted by this school. It was argued that pupils behaving deviantly posed a danger to the community of their classmates. They were found to have moral and character deficits and were therefore not able to attend regular schools. A paradigm shift occurred with the increasing influence of psychological and sociological research: Whereas the focus had previously been on the threat deviant children posed to society, new attention was now being paid to the threat society posed to children, making them ‘ill’, and the exclusion from school that stigmatises them. The paper shows the changing conceptualization of the relationship between adolescents and society. (2) In contrast to this pedagogy for ‘behaviourally difficult students’, the separate schooling of ‘learning disabled’ in specific ‘Hilfsschulen’ [support schools] has a long tradition since the early 20th century. However, there was also a drastic quantitative increase during the period considered. Debates on ability and the new socio-political promise of equal opportunities led to a change in the legitimisation of separate schooling, which is now based primarily on the right of the child to adequate support. Demands for integration only gained influence in the following decade but remained limited primarily to professional discourse and the programmatic level. Nonetheless, in this context, ascriptions to adolescents changed fundamentally.

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