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On August 21, 2026, the International Seminar on Global Governance for Human Security, co-organized by the Global Network Program, was held in a hybrid format.

The seminar featured Dr. Hiromichi Katayama, Programme Specialist in the Education Sector at the UNESCO Jakarta Regional Office, and Dr. Sheena Bell, Postdoctoral Fellow at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE), University of Toronto in Canada.

Under the theme “Political and Comparative Analysis of Education,” Dr. Katayama began by introducing analytical and operational approaches to technical and vocational education and training (TVET), drawing on the UNESCO Strategy for TVET 2022–2029. He highlighted the role of TVET in promoting individual fulfilment, sustainable economies, and social justice, as well as the importance of analyzing national TVET systems in relation to their specific socio-economic contexts, including issues of quality, governance, and financing. He also introduced UNESCO’s approaches to TVET Policy Review, Policy Development, and Policy Implementation Planning, illustrating the process from policy diagnosis and strategy development to implementation.

Dr. Bell then introduced political approaches to education policy adoption and implementation, drawing on her research on district education offices in Ghana. She emphasized that policymaking and implementation are political processes shaped by resource allocation, competing interests, and power relations. Focusing on the “middle tier” between national authorities and schools, she illustrated through examples such as teacher allocation how formal rules and policies can be implemented differently depending on local conditions, political relationships, authority, and available resources. Her presentation highlighted the importance of examining education policy not only from a technical perspective but also through the political and institutional factors that shape its implementation.

A total of 296 students and faculty members participated in the seminar, including 16 in person and 280 online. During the question-and-answer session, participants actively exchanged views on how to identify and estimate the skills demanded by labour markets in international comparative analysis, how partnerships among governments, international organizations, the private sector, and other stakeholders can be developed and analyzed in TVET policy processes, and how political and institutional factors can be incorporated into the analysis of education policy implementation. The seminar provided a valuable opportunity to deepen participants’ understanding of the importance of examining education policies within their specific socio-economic and institutional contexts, while considering both technical and political dimensions in understanding the processes of policy development and implementation.