Europe's Lifelong Learning Markets, Governance and Policy

This book explores European governance and policy coordination within lifelong learning markets. Using an instruments approach, the editors and contributors examine the ways in which governance mechanisms employed by the European Union influence policy to regulate lifelong learning, and intervene in lifelong learning markets, at both European and national levels. Filling an important gap in the current literature, this book examines how strengthened policy coordination at the EU level contributed to the blurring of boundaries between policy fields and the redefinition of the function of adult education after the 2008 recession. Divided into three parts, this book draws on a range of case studies from countries including Spain, Denmark, Bulgaria and the UK. It will be of interest and value to students and scholars of education policy and governance, adult education and lifelong learning. 

“This book makes a significant and rigorous contribution to policy studies in the field of adult education, for which the team of authors are to be congratulated.” (Alan Tuckett, International Review of Education, Vol. 66, 2020)

Marcella Milana is Associate Professor at the University of Verona, Italy, and Honorary Professor of Adult Education at the University of Nottingham, United Kingdom, and is joint editor of the International Journal of Lifelong Education. She researches the politics, policy and governance of adult education, from comparative and global perspectives.Gosia Klatt is Senior Lecturer at the Centre for Vocational and Educational Policy at the University of Melbourne, Australia. Her research interests cover education policy, education systems, transitions from school, post-communist transitions, Europeanisation and intergovernmental relations in Australia and Europe.Sandra Vatrella is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Verona, Italy. She holds a PhD in Sociology and Social Research, and specialises in education policies, adult education, and prison ethnography. She has published on prison education and Italian education policies and governance, among other topics.