Suchergebnisse

The consolidation of the welfare state in Europe after World War II allowed for the development of adult education programmes aimed at social inclusion, economic growth and democratic citizenship. Lifelong education, proposed by UNESCO (1970s), allowed countries to build adult education policies combining the needs of economic growth and increasing democratic social demands, based on adults' emancipation. In the last two decades, the European Union (EU) orientation for lifelong learning has stressed the formation of education and training to prepare workers to be more productive, and the creation of partnership (public/private) provision, according to managerial rules and procedures. These two distinct political approaches have influenced the evolution of adult education in Portugal. In this paper we argue that the civil society organisations (CSOs) of Portugal today are trapped within a set of technical procedures that have been established in the name of lifelong learning and that EU programmes have made it very difficult for CSOs to escape national state control. This situation impedes innovative and alternative attempts to promote social emancipation. (DIPF/orig.)

Social economy in its many variations and vague delimitations is an environment produced by global capitalism. Yet it may also enable social practices and learning processes which might not necessarily follow the mainstream rules of today's capitalism. In fact, such social practices can be seen as a learning outcome responding to life conditions and contradictions in capitalism. If we understand societal dynamics as historical and material processes we must direct empirical attention to study the micro-processes in which such endogenous dynamics may potentially grow up. Assuming that learning within such micro-processes form the key to any agentic capacity of social change this thematic issue has visited a few particular cases which expose specific learning environment and specific learning processes. Even though some of the articles do not theorize learning very explicitly they seem to indicate that social economy can be both the presupposition and the potential outcome of such emergent learning processes. (DIPF/Orig.)

"The frontier between the south of Spain and Portugal is established by the river Guadiana. Next to the sea, the cities of Ayamonte (Spain) and Vila Real de Santo António (Portugal) are facing each other on opposite banks of the river. The research on which this chapter is based focuses on these two cities. The authors study specifically personal and social relationships and processes of the identity building of experts on cross-border cooperation in the southern European cross-border area of Spain and Portugal. Are the experts who are frequently involved in cross-border experiences, as a result of their personal and professional lives, experiencing or having transnational lives and transnational flows? To answer this question the authors analysed the biographies of a wide range of people with different life experiences regarding cross-border cooperation in both countries. The interviews were open-ended and included a structured module for analysing the social networks of the respondents. The results suggest that there are no traces of a significant transnational character in the relationships established in this particular cross-border area." (author's abstract)

The present study intends to understand how factors influence employed adults' decision to participate in learning activities in two sectors of the five regions (NUT II) of the Portuguese continental territory. The factors associated to individuals' participation in Continuing Vocational Education and Training (CVET) constitute an important issue to be studied given the need to understand why adults participate in CVET activities. This is important because continuing professional qualification of workers is assumed to be essential to improve workers' employability and productivity in companies. In fact, the level of productivity of business depends on effective use of new technologies which is only possible with human resources continuously qualified. For this reason, results will allow us to elaborate recommendations for designing and implementing policies for CVET activities. The present research will be using a methodological approach framed by the ISSTAL (Interdisciplinary, Sequential- Specificity, Time-Allocation, Life-Span) model of social participation (Smith, 1980), already adapted and tested in USA by Cookson (1986) and in Alentejo and other EU regions by Figueira & others (2008) for studying adult participation in learning activities. The study will use a cross-sectional survey complemented by a focus group strategy to discuss survey results by continuing training specialists and practitioners and by a set of case studies to further understanding nature of the participation factors. The cross-sectional survey will use an instrument specifically developed to collect data from a two-stage stratified random sample drawn from a population constituted by technical working people of the two main sectors in the above Portuguese continental regions. According to results from previous studies, it will be expected that the ISSTAL model will be useful for explaining and understanding participation of adults in continuing training activities concerning the sectors of activity under analysis. The study will give an important contribution for promoting equal access to CVET for all workers, as a relevant pathway for a sustainable development of the Portuguese society.