Module 5

Coordination: Licinio Lima (Braga) and Danny Wildemeersch (Leuven/Nijmegen)
Visiting lecturer: Dr. Astrid Von Kotze (Durban, South Africa)

Frame of Reference

In this module, we will explore the leading policy concepts concerning lifelong education and lifelong learning in the international context. We will thereby make use of the distinction Griffin (1998) makes between ‘progressive social democratic models’ and neo-liberal reform models. We will follow this author's observation that in most of the advanced Western countries, the progressive social democratic model is inspiring many policy documents (e.g. Unesco, Oecd, European Union). We will study some of the documents in view of this observation.

We will furthermore explore in an exemplary way the actual policies concerning lifelong learning of some particular European countries, especially with respect to adult basic education or literacy education. We will take the countries of the students as a point of departure. Therefore, we want them to bring with them sorme policy documents related to lifelong learning and especially basic education which have been developed in their own countries recently. We will investigate to what extent these national documents and practices also reflect this progressive social democratic orientation. It is assumed that in practice, the neo-liberal reform influence is stronger than suggested in the above mentioned supra national documents.

We will also investigate to what extent globalization processes actually reinforce some of these neo-liberal policy developments and destabilize traditional welfare models. It is assumed that the pressure of international competition strongly directs such policies and limits the freedom of national policy makers. We will finally analyze what alternative policy options are being put forward on different levels.

Objectives: students will be able

• To understand the current pressures that give direction to social policy orientations
• To understand how educational policy is part of wider social policy developments
• To interpret particular policy developments in EU member states in view of more general policy developments and global transformative processes such as globalization
• To report about policy developments and to apply them to the particular situation of the country they come from
• To analyze and interpret some of the differences in adult education policy making between various European countries
• To understand the strengths and limitations of the nation state with respect to social and educational policy making

General Outline of the Program

The Program will be conceived as such that in the morning (Monday, Tuesday, Thursday), the students will be systematically informed about theoretical insights, while in the afternoon they will be asked to go deeper into these insights either via the reading of papers or via the application to particular contexts, The last day will be dedicated to synthesizing and presentation activities by the students.