Comparative Education Review 301 Presidential Address Reflections on Theory, Method, and Practice in Comparative and International Education

I have been very fortunate in my professional life in many ways. One way is that I get paid, in part, to reflect on some of the significant issues of our day. Over the years, my views have evolved, shaped by what I have seen, discussed, experienced, read, and studied. I wish to take the opportunity afforded by this presidential address to reflect on what I believe and how I came to believe it. I hold strong views about our field of comparative and international education, views that often clash with the dominant modes of theory, method, and practice. In this address, I wish to explain what I see as fundamental flaws in some of these dominant modes of thinking and explore what some of the alternatives to those views are. I will begin by saying a few words about how I see the field of comparative and international education and then discuss theory, method, and practice in turn. Comparative and International Education Over the past 60 years, we have seen enormous development of the field of comparative and international education (CIE), from one that was a foca