Search Results

Social exclusion and inclusion have emerged as strong policy-leading concepts at both the national and international level in recent years. Policies on lifelong learning are themselves in part premised on the contribution education and training can make to promoting an inclusive society. It is argued that social exclusion offends against human dignity, denies people their fundamental human rights and leads, in conjunction with social and economic instability, to marginalisation and deepening inequalities, which threaten the stability of democracy. Social inclusion therefore appears to be an unconditional good. The argument in this paper suggests that this is not the case. Drawing on critical social policy studies and post-structuralist philosophy, we argue that the notion of inclusion relies on exclusions, some of which may be chosen and even desirable. We suggest that those interested in lifelong learning should take a more critical stance towards the social inclusion agenda to which it is being harnessed.

Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

Drawing on the work of Foucault, and to a lesser extent actor-network theory, this article examines some of their methodological and theoretical implications for conceptions of workplace learning. We suggest that workplaces need to be examined for the spatio-temporal ordering of practices and the actors drawn into them in order to move beyond the totalising discourses of, for instance, the knowledge economy, globalisation, performativity and even workplace learning itself. We argue that there is no single trajectory for workplaces and that pedagogic practices are embedded in the actor-networks of specific workplaces. This is illustrated by way of a critique of discourses that posit a simple move from disciplined, Fordist work to more flexible forms of work. In this way, we seek to locate discussions of workplace learning within the wider debates in the social sciences about changing practices of governing and the differing forms of subjectivity associated with them. The article is intended to be illuminative and is theory driven.

Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

John Field (2000) has recently argued that there are changes taking place in the practices of governing that have significant implications for lifelong learning. In particular, he points to attempts to mobilise civil society, of which lifelong learning policies may be considered a part. This paper examines this proposition by locating Field’s argument within wider debates about governmentality and the attempt to fashion calculating and enterprising selves. Drawing on actor-network theory, the paper then explores some of the ways in which changes in the curriculum associated with lifelong learning contribute to that process. In bringing together the discussion of lifelong learning, governmentality and actor-network theory, the paper provides a framing for researching the effects of policy and, more precisely, the differential ways in which active subjects are mobilised.

Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

In a wide range of fields, professional practice is being transformed by the increasing influence of digital analytics: the massive volumes of big data, and software algorithms that are collecting, comparing and calculating that data to make predictions and even decisions. Researchers in a number of social sciences have been calling attention to the far-reaching and accelerating consequences of these forces, claiming that many professionals, researchers, policy-makers and the public are just beginning to realise the enormous potentials and challenges these analytics are producing. Yet, outside of particular areas of research and practice, such as learning analytics, there has been little discussion of this to date in the broader education literature.

This article aims to set out some key issues particularly relevant to the understandings of professional practice, knowledge and learning posed by the linkages of big data and software code. It begins by outlining definitions, forms and examples of these analytics, their potentialities and some of the hidden impact, and then presents issues for researchers and educators. It seeks to contribute to and extend debates taking place in certain quarters to a broader professional education and work audience.

Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

This article gives an autobiographical account of two adult educators engaged in what may be seen as an identity crisis for contemporary adult education. Through this autobiographical analysis, the authors address the question of what it means to be an adult educator or to practice adult education in circumstances where dedifferentiation has taken hold under the sign of lifelong learning. They outline the challenges taking place to many of the practices and institutional structures of adult education. At the heart of these, they argue, ‘there is an intensification of reflexivity wherein the identity crises with which we are working is both a condition for and a response to increasing individualisation and reflexivity’. They illustrate the link between reflexivity and identity using their autobiographies to exemplify the processes operating under the sign of lifelong learning. Finally, the authors explore the cultural conditions that give rise to the similarities and differences in their autobiographical bricolages, in particular the rise of the new middle classes, the increased significance of popular culture and the development of postmodern positions. Show less

As lifelong learning becomes a greater focus for policy at local, national and supranational levels, a question emerges as to how to engage in policy analysis. This is a debate, which is already taking place in relation to policy analysis in other sectors of education. However, this has had little influence on policy studies in lifelong learning. This paper reviews the wider debates and argues for the productiveness of a discursive approach to policy analysis. In particular, it argues that the notion of metaphor can be deployed in such analysis to good effect. This is illustrated through an initial analysis of the UK government’s 1998 Green Paper, ‘The learning age: a renaissance for a new Britain’.

Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

This article attempts to interpret the structural significance of the discourses of adult educational guidance and counselling for current social, economic and cultural processes. The author draws parallels with Foucault's analysis of the confessional to suggest a similar definitional, identifying and repressive imperative within educational counselling. In the light of these considerations, the concept of life planning is seen to be problematic in a context of economic and cultural instability. Show less

This article explores the discursive work done by different notions of professional development in adult education. In particular we outline the ways in which the discourses of technical expertise, competence and reflective practice are deployed to mobilise professional practices and identities in particular ways and position certain practices and dispositions as specifically professional. We suggest that these discourses help to shape the negotiations between economies of performance and ecologies of practice within which professionals operate. We argue that much of this work is implicit in the pedagogies and curriculum of programmes for adult educators and that there is a need for detailed empirical research on the pedagogies of professional development and practice in adult education. With moves in Europe to develop professional standards for adult educators we suggest that studying the rhetoric of professional development provides an opportunity to open some existing diverse practices to new forms of scrutiny.

Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

This paper seeks to extend work previously published that points to the importance of rhetorical analysis to policy studies. It argues against the notion that policy can be dismissed as ‘spin’ and explores further the work of rhetoric within the UK government’s policy texts of lifelong learning. For the authors, rhetorical analysis helps to point to the politics of discourse that is at play in policy-making processes. This paper points to some of the conceptual resources upon which one can draw in undertaking rhetorical deconstructions of policy texts and discourses, in this case, of lifelong learning, and one’s own role, as analysts and sultans of spin.

Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

The notions of lifelong learning and a learning society have been an important policy driver in the European Union at both the Commission and national government levels for a number of years. Overall, these policies aim to promote the twin goals of competitiveness in international markets and social cohesion within the still-expanding borders of the Union itself. To date, however, the impact of this emphasis on lifelong learning has been relatively slight. This article argues that this is in part because the policy process in relation to the development of a learning society is based on a view of governance and power that is open to reasoned dispute, and is, therefore, bound to disappoint in relation to its espoused goals. It is suggested that, rather than implementation being the main 'problem' of policy, the policy context inevitably generates many recontextualisations and renegotiations of meanings according to the situations and the actors involved, thereby undermining the notion of 'implementation' as a technical-rational process. It is argued that the complex negotiations enacted at local level reveal and are fashioned by tensions between the membership resources available to actors. This emphasises complexity, diversity, and difference in policy processes, bringing to the fore a communicative and distributed approach to policy rather than one that is technical and centralising.

Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less