Society is not built by education alone: alternative routes to a learning society

Abstract

This article examines the notion of a learning society in Britain by outlining some of the chief arguments currently being used to advocate the establishment of such a society. These arguments have two main strands – that the standard of education and training has a direct impact on the economy and that therefore expenditure on lifelong learning is an investment that will be recouped, and the claim that there is a lack of justice in the distribution of education and its rewards in Britain today. The article also involves a brief consideration of the extent to which a learning society already exists. Using preliminary findings from a large-scale study of participation in adult education and training over 50 years in industrial South Wales, it concludes that to some extent ‘Learning Society’ is used by policy-makers and academics as a term of convenience. It is an ideal notion (but one with very prosaic targets couched in terms of certification) which helps mask the lack of real progress in some respects towards an ‘educated public’