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In this article, inclusive education is analysed from the perspective of the interlinked, dynamic relationship between international neo-liberal movements and national policies and practices. The aim is to explore the significance of "competence" in recent Norwegian reforms and the changing position attributed to inclusion. The analysis shows that during a very short period from 1997 to the present date Norway has seen a rapid change from a highly state-regulated system with an expressed emphasis on inclusive education policies to one of decentralisation, with an emphasis on competencies, differences and individualisation. I discuss the impact of international studies on national reforms in neo-liberal direction and the implications of such reforms for inclusive education policies and practices in Norway.

The terrain of inclusion studies in discussed in this paper from the perspective of policy discourses and teachers' constructions on student diversity. We start by discussing the concept of inclusion from normative and analystic perspectives. We then look at the kinds of discourses that can be found in the Finnish and Norwegian curricula, as well as teachers' interviews when they talk about their students. On this basis we analyse how the patterns of diversity and inclusion are conceived and constructed; the phenomenon of "diversity", as it is formulated in policy documents and as it is expressed in categories with which teachers operate and act upon in school; and, "diversity" in the context of inclusive practices. We draw from ethnographic studies in Finnish and Norwegian schools; both from mainstream and from special classes. (Contains 6 notes.)

This study demonstrated how everyday discourses of discipline and control, as well as professional discourses of problem behavior, intersected with ethnicity and masculinities, highlighting how the masculinities and ethnicities of a male Norwegian secondary student and his male teacher intersected in the classroom and how they connected with other areas of school life and with educational policy and research. (SM)