Explaining the continuation of technical college nursing training in Germany

In Germany, basic nursing training still takes place at technical colleges. This type of training lacks standardisation, leaving considerable freedom to colleges and their providers. The purpose of this paper is to identify the reasons for the continuation of technical college training for nurses in Germany.

The paper adopts an actor‐based approach which restricts the notion of “actor” to the level of organisations. The interplay between these actors is put in a context in which institutions maintain traditional structures of training. The study employs the method of document analysis. The method of analysis is qualitative content analysis.

The investigation shows that it is an interplay between key actors involved in a conflict over nurses’ education which, together with institutions, is responsible for the persistence of technical college‐based nursing training as the standard basic qualification. The relevant institutions are those regulating the health professions and institutions to which a model of ancillary nursing work is oriented. These are in turn embedded in the German system of health care provision and the corporatist health care governance. The study exposes several cross‐relationships between actor‐based and institutional explanatory factors.

The empirical study is limited to the extent that it excludes the micro‐level of nursing work. It provides a framework for comparative research on educational standards in health care in that it pins down specific variables.

The paper develops a framework for analysing the reasons for the continuation of national educational standards of health professions despite a general European process of changing these standards.