How can we understand the nation-state and its role in a transnational landscape of educational policy? I argue that one way to begin to sort out this extensive question is to understand these partial but significant mix of processes of globalization deep inside the national state as a hybrid – neither fully private or public, nor fully global or national (Sassen 2003b). I suggest that this hybridity is conceptualized in terms of denationalization. Following Sassen (2003a), a key element in denationalization is that the states do not only participate in common understandings of global agreements, but that their actions and role also are transformed through the specific type of work entailed in coming to an international consensus (modes of negotiations, preparatory work in different international networks and the like). Another aspect of denationalization is a reunderstanding of ‘the local’. The idea of ‘the local’ needs to be rethought, and be seen as parts of multi-scalar systems (e.g. the Mumbai housing movement, Appadurai 2013), rather than as specifically demarcated local places or as holding a special place in a hierarchy (c.f. Sassen 2003a).

The purpose with this paper is to examine the Swedish conception of education in a transnational as well as national context. I will focus on two factors: a shift in the role of the state in the formation of educational policy and a shift in the concept of ' the citizen' in compulsory school's citizenship education. The examination includes the three most recent curriculum reforms from the early 1980s to the present day. In the first part of the paper, I explore the concepts of globalism and transnationalism and suggest how these concepts can be understood as related to the concept of nation-state, with a specific focus on educational policy and the concept of knowledge. Drawing on Sassen and Schmidt, I also suggest a theoretical framework that I will argue is helpful as a base for the analysis. In the second part of the paper, I turn to Sweden for my analysis of the two foci mentioned above. I use three official reports, related to the last three curricula in order to analyze shifts in state agency in the field of educational policy from 1970s and onwards. For the analysis of the concept of the 'citizen’ in curricula, I take my starting point in an analysis of educational conceptions in Englund (1986/2005). In the third part, finally, I discuss my results and suggest from what conditions a conception of education can be understood as denationalized .