Political, economic and cultural contexts

The importance of context, whether cultural, economic, political or social, for understanding the complexities of learning and teaching, lies at the heart of TLRP’s research. How context is conceptualised, however, has differed across and within the projects and thematic work that has been undertaken. This is, to some extent, because of the different social scientific approaches that are used by TLRP researchers with ‘policy context’ uppermost by education and social policy researchers, whilst an embedded approach is taken by those with a more social and psychological perspective. It can also be illustrated in how socio-economic and political context underpins the principles that we have enunciated and found most especially in principles 1, 3 and 10, viz:

• to ‘equip learners for life in its broadest sense’,
•  ‘recognises the importance of prior experience and learning’
• which ‘demands consistent policy frameworks with support for teaching and learning as their primary focus’

Illustrations of how socio-political and economic factors as a generic theme are threaded throughout can be found in the contrasting thematic work undertaken by two rather theoretically and methodologically different teams. First, a group of economists as educational researchers, using largely quantitative methods to understand and explain the so-called ‘Wider Benefits of Learning’ have provided evidence:

•  on the impact of social, economic, medical and environmental factors and interventions through the lifecourse.

Secondly, a cross-disciplinary team of social and sociological researchers using some of the TLORP projects across the life-course have provided a more methodological and philosophical consideration of how to reconceptualise

• notions of contexts, communities and networks: Mobilising learners’ resources and relationships in different domains. (Edwards, R et al 2008 to be published by Routledge).

Thirdly, given the ways in which policy-relevant research has been at the heart of TLRP's suite of projects, there are key examples of how  projects have fore-grounded the political and policy context, especially with respect to perhaps the most contentious policy arena, that of post-compulsory further and higher education and issues of widening access and participation, viz:

• Policy, Learning and inclusion in the Learning and Skills Sector (Coffield, F 2007 in the Improving Learning series published by Routledge)
• Transforming Learning Cultures in FE (Hodgkinson, P, Biesta, G 2007 ’s in the Improving Learning series published by Routledge)
• Within the suite of Widening Participation to HE projects, examples include the study of Dual Regimes of FE & HE and the project entitled Degrees of success: the Transition between VET and HE.

Publications related to the general theme of political, economic and cultural contexts are listed below: