On Theory and Policy in Financing Lifelong Learning

The recent rapid acceptance of the lifelong learning concept is an excellent example of the great distance that continues to exist between social science theory and public policy. The lifelong learning concept itself is no "newer" than the many other rediscovered ideas that dominate the educational literature; the origins of its current incarnation can be traced fairly specifically, however, to the "Faure Report"Learning to Be-published by UNESCO in 1972. This report, which one excessively enthusiastic reviewer (Platt 1974) suggested marked a new direction in educational planning, was characterized by two distinct traits which guaranteed its warm reception: a vague definition of the forms which lifelong education would take in practice and an almost total disregard of the types and sources of funding. The support for lifelong learning has been quick to appear; after all, the United States and several other Western nations were suffering from a market surplus of professional educators and facing secular declines in the traditional school-aged cohort. The educational bureaucracy continues to be the single most important source of political support for lifelong learning programs. An unfortunate side effect of the lifelong learning enthusiasm is that international agencies such as UNESCO and the World Bank have promoted the acceptance of this new policy direction in many less developed nations. Thus one can find in the Third World educational systems that fail to educate one-half of the traditional school-aged cohort to a level of permanent literacy and yet are being asked to expand adult learning opportunities. At the margin in such an educational system, some tradeoff must be occurring between the traditional educational sector and the new programs. The question of concern is whether adequate consideration has been given to this implicit decision. Experience with other educational innovations leads one to assume not.