Moving beyond skills as a social and economic panacea

Ewart Keep and Ken Mayhew
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Ewart Keep: ESRC Centre on Skills, Knowledge and Organisational Performance, Cardiff University, KeepEJ@Cardiff.ac.uk

Work, Employment & Society, 2010, vol. 24, issue 3, 565-577

Abstract: This article examines two inter-related issues. First, the tendency for UK skills policies to act as a substitute for other social and economic measures. Second, the problem of current conceptualisations of skills policy creating narrowly-drawn, technicist interventions that are frequently incommensurate with the scale of the problems which they purpor t to tackle. The ar ticle suggests that current policy formation processes, particularly in England, are being deployed in a manner that seeks to close off consideration of other potential avenues by which contemporary social and economic problems might be addressed. The case is made for a wider framing of both policy possibilities and avenues for relevant research to support such policy development.

Keywords: jobs; skills; social equality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:woemps:v:24:y:2010:i:3:p:565-577

DOI: 10.1177/0950017010371663

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