Education, Training and the Future of Work I: Social, Political and Economic Contexts of Policy Development / Edition 1

by John Ahier, Geoff Esland

Overview

A central claim of this volume is that public policy in education and training can only be properly understood if it is seen in relation to prevailing economic and employment conditions. It has become increaslingly apparent that the neo-liberal economic policies pursued by Western governments during the 1980s and 1990s have led to a growing world-wide 'work crisis'. Unemployment levels, particularly in Europe, remain persistently high, and for those in employment, job insecurity and long working hours have become the norm. The response of UK governments has been to promote 'flexibility' in employment practices while proclaiming the importance of improving skill levels through education and training.
This volume challenges the adequacy of such an approach, and asks whether reliance on education and training reforms without additional political intervention in economic processes is capable of reversing current trends.
Issues covered in this reader include:
* the impact of globalization on employment trends
* neo-liberal and neo-Keynesian approaches to employment policy
* political reforms in education and training institutions
* the impact of flexibilization on private life and the family.
The two volumes in this series are readers for the Open University course Education, Training and the Future of Work, E837, a module of the MA in Education. The companion volume is Education, Training and the Future of Work II: Developments in Vocational Education and Training.
John Ahier is Lecturer in Education at the Open University. Geoff Esland is Director of the Centre for Sociology and Social Research at the Open University and Course team Chair of E837.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780415202091
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	01/21/1999
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.19(h) x (d)

Table of Contents

	Figures and tables	vii
	Preface	viii
	Acknowledgements	xiii
	Source acknowledgements	xiv
	Introduction	1
1	The changing nature of work	14
2	Education, globalization and economic development	31
3	The great work dilemma: education, employment and wages in the new global economy	62
4	The new knowledge work	76
5	Jobs and people	97
6	Evaluating the assumptions that underlie training policy	113
7	Expanding employment	141
8	Managerializing organizational culture: refashioning the human resource in educational institutions	160
9	The University of Life plc: the 'industrialization' of higher education?	186
10	Economic restructuring and unemployment: a crisis for masculinity?	199
11	Social change and labour market transitions	219
12	Big pictures and the detail: school work experience policy and the local labour market in the 1990s	236
	Index	258

Editorial Reviews

In this reader for the UK Open U. MA program for educators, a dozen recent, mostly reprinted selections confront the changing nature of work in the global economy and its impact on school work experience policy and the local 1990s labor market. Vol. II addresses vocational policy development. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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