National high-stakes exams are a fundamental structural feature of education systems around the world. Despite their importance in shaping educational stratification, little is known about the social processes that influence how and why national high-stakes exams are used at early ages on a global basis. I argue that global trends in the use of primary-level high-stakes exams during the postwar period are shaped by competing international and historical pressures. On one hand, Western colonialism instigated path-dependent processes that led former French and British colonies to continue to use high-stakes exams at the primary level, even after gaining independence. On the other hand, a worldwide cultural shift toward universalistic conceptions of education as a human right has led other countries to abandon high-stakes exams at early ages. Drawing on a newly constructed panel data set of 138 countries from 1960 to 2010, I show that national high-stakes exams have declined over time at early ages of schooling. Evidence from a series of panel regression models supports arguments about the importance of Western colonialism and universalistic conceptions of education in world society in shaping the use of high-stakes exams at the primary level.

全国高考是世界各地教育系统的基本结构特征。尽管它们在形成教育分层中起着重要作用，但对于影响在全球范围内早年使用国家高水平考试的方式和原因的社会过程知之甚少。我认为，战后时期全球使用小学高水平考试的趋势是由相互竞争的国际和历史压力所塑造的。一方面，西方殖民主义煽动了路径依赖的过程，这些过程导致前法国和英国殖民地即使在获得独立后仍继续在小学阶段使用高分考试。另一方面，世界范围内的文化向普遍主义的教育观念转变为人权，这导致其他国家早早放弃了高考。从1960年到2010年的138个国家的最新面板数据集上，我表明，全国高考水平在受教育的早期阶段就随着时间而下降。一系列面板回归模型的证据支持了有关西方殖民主义和世界主义教育观念在塑造初等教育中高分考试的重要性方面的论点。