The aim of this article is to provide an analysis and synthesis of how the policy trend of competence-based education (CBE) has been transforming curriculum policy into competence-based curricula (CBC) in pre-university education in different parts of the world for the last three decades. Based on a systematic research review covering 1997–2022, the analysis and synthesis present how the policy movement is not reducible to any singular account but rather is to be understood as a dynamic interplay of transnational and national adaptations, which also have changed in character over time. The recontextualization of CBE-reforms has changed as the ‘social imaginary’ of the challenges facing education and clusters of ideas with different underpinnings has evolved. In addition to the thematic analysis of how research on the CBE/CBC policy and implementation of (key) competences has altered public outlooks on the future of schooling, five visions of CBE/CBC–‘as a curriculum policy discourse’, ‘as a curriculum policy recommendation’, ‘as curriculum add-on’, ‘as operationalized into learning outcomes’, and ‘as curriculum-transformative’–are identified and outlined. It is concluded that the future-oriented competence education approaches promoted transnationally became socially performative through adoption of CBC reforms nationally. © 2025 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
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