An examination of nurses' professional work and life in the context of the ongoing institutional restructuring of health care systems in seven European countries, England, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. Professional experience and expertise is discussed from the nurses' perspective and focuses on how they deal with restructuring measures caused by changes in policy and administration.

European welfare institutions such as education and health care are restructuring their organisations in terms of decentralisation, deregulation, privatization and so forth. As a consequence professional positions and demands on professional competencies in these institutions are in transition. At the same time European societies are changing in different ways, e.g. in terms of a "knowledge society" as well as in demographic and cultural changes. Professionals such as teachers and nurses are meeting such changes in their work with students and clients.Thus, there is a need to study these transitions and changes. Here we are doing this from a "bottom-up" perspective where we are comparing experiences in different institutional and national contexts. This study combines two kinds of narrative research; a study of the systemic narratives produced by governments who are restructuring educational systems and the life history narratives of those professionals working within those systems and their perspectives on ongoing restructuring.

Across the developed world, most of us who work now earn our living in the service sector. However, the issue of what kind of service economy is sustainable and desirable, both in economic and social terms, is rarely debated. This book argues that this needs to change. National governments have emphasised the role of skills in achieving international competitiveness, higher living standards, and social inclusion. However, even prior to the 2008 financial crisis, problems of over-qualification, skills wastage, and poor job quality were becoming difficult to ignore. This raises important questions about what kind of service sector jobs will be on offer to meet the aspirations of an increasingly qualified workforce and what role can governments play in raising the skills required in jobs and the quality of jobs and services? Work organisation and job design are key factors shaping the skill content of work and the opportunities workers have to deploy their skills and capabilities. Through cross-national comparative research, this book examines whether and why service sector jobs vary across countries. Drawing upon detailed empirical research, the jobs of vocational teacher, fitness instructor, and café worker in the UK, Norway, and France are compared, allowing an exploration of the role of national institutions, sectors, and organisations in shaping work organisation and job quality. The findings contribute to the comparative study of work organisation, the relationship between skills and performance, the role and purpose of education and the prospects for better jobs in 'the age of over-qualification'.

Education is a contested terrain. The symmetry of education reform among the seven countries examined in this volume is remarkable. There is much commonality in the issues they raise, in the competing groups battling over education policy, their policy choices, and the implementation of such policies. Also, all seven countries address the same issues: equity, global competition, the performance of their students. There are at least six important traits characterizing these battles: the context, the combatants, the issues, the process, and the policies. To begin with, history, culture, and governance regime set the context for education policy and reform. Second, there is the process of how these battles are waged--is compromise an outcome or is it a zero sum contest? Third, there appear to be four groups of combatants each with its own ideology representing a particular social class in society and their views about education and its uses: Conservatives, Socialists, Neo-Liberals, and Elites. Education is an important and valued resource that each status group tries to control and shape to its own views. Fourth, there are key issues that drive education reform: how education can best flatten a social system, how education train students for work, and how education socializes students to be functioning citizens. In recent years, fifth issue has emerged: student performance on international standardized tests. Not only is a society’s international reputation based on their students’ performance, but nations see such performance as an indicator of the quality of their educational system and if it is good enough to secure its economic future. Finally, there are the policies themselves--do they reduce or increase inequality, who benefits and how? The chapters in this volume clearly point out that education reform is not a homogeneous process as some scholars have conjectured. Rather, education reform involves heated battles over the control of the educational system because education is seen as a key factor in maintaining a society’s vision and social structure.

High quality education and training systems are essential for European welfare and for developing a knowledge-based society. This publication aims to give an overview of the European research carried out in the 6th and 7th Framework Programs. These education and training projects deal with knowledge and skills (Lisbon Strategy), inclusion and cohesion (Social Agenda), culture, youth and migration (Citizenship), horizontal, international and support actions.--Publisher's description.

Storying the Public Intellectual: Commentaries on the Impact and Influence of the Work of Ivor Goodson offers a critcal commentary on Goodson’s work that avoids hagiography whilst recognising the global reach of his scholarship. With contributors from around the world, those who have collaborated with him or those who have taken up his work, the book provides the sort of social and historical contextualising that Goodson has always advocated. The accounts in this collection highlight how Goodson’s integration of moral imperatives into strategically responsive scholarship can provide a useful roadmap when negotiating a path through the contemporary academic research landscape. By using his historian’s orientation and sensibilities he is able to get to the heart of the logics of schooling. By connecting with other scholars and researchers around the world, he exposes how the global neo-liberal project plays out in particular settings, and so challenges pervasive understandings about the meaning of global – and the power of the neo-liberal project itself. This book is ideal reading for academics, scholars and researchers in the field of education, including those involved in initial and in-service teacher education.

This title looks at the contemporary need to study life narratives, considers the emergence and salience of life narratives in contemporary culture, and discusses different forms of narrativity.