MEDIATION
“Capacity is the ability of people, organisations and society as a whole to manage their affairs successfully.”70 A fundamental requirement for countries in transition is to strengthen the capacity to formulate national reform agendas. In VET reform, the capacity of social partners is rapidly becoming a determining factor. Social partners need to develop the competences needed to formulate policies and shape reform initiatives that fit into contexts and that therefore establish better conditions for
ownership and sustainability of VET reform. This requires more focus on how to organise policy learning
environments in the countries enabling a critical mass of key actors and stakeholders to develop competence in VET policy development and implementation.
Capacity development is the “process whereby people, organisations, and society as a whole unleash, strengthen, create, adapt, and maintain capacity over time”
(EuropeAid, 2009). Like learning, capacity development takes place in people or organisations, and, like learning, it cannot be forced upon them.
The role of the ETF in the reform process in south eastern Europe is to facilitate human capital development by making available expertise and information on policies and practice in education and training through participatory processes of stakeholder interaction. As we wrote earlier, one of the ways in which this is done is by involving policy
makers and senior officials from the sector as peers in order to create the conditions for better targeted capacity building (Nikolovska & Vos, 2008). But the ETF’s purpose is not simply to create policy learning environments for individuals. The end goal is to enable them to formulate their own reform policies as a result of their learning. For this, there are important aspects that need to be taken into account, including the following:
+ VET reform and change has to be carried out largely by existing staff, and despite widespread agreement on global policy objectives and improved policies, reform actors might still be uncomfortable at the prospect of changing traditional ways. Accomplishing change is about reversing deeply embedded policies and strongly held beliefs, including social partners’ beliefs.
+ While system change in countries was traditionally designed centrally and decreed from above, this political culture is slowly changing. This allows local agents to claim a stake in the design of reform concepts. With the growing acknowledgement of its importance, education is increasingly attracting the attention of many different lobbies and constituencies and it is obvious that VET is one domain that will gradually grow as a priority on the agenda of the social partners.
+ Modern reform approaches are seeking ways of involving the various stakeholders in a meaningful way. The same is valid for social partners: they need to see meaning in why they are called upon to take part in the policy process.
+ Collaboration becomes a necessity. If all stakeholders are to function together, a clear sense of public purpose is needed and so are new forms of partnerships and new skills.
As has been stated in EuropeAid’s Toolkit for Capacity Development (EuropeAid, 2009), change is an internal process that has to happen within people or
organisations. This basic insight has four important implications:
+ Capacity development must be owned by those whose capacity is being developed, otherwise it simply does not happen.
+ External partners cannot design and implement capacity development. They can support capacity development processes or help to create the right external incentives for them.
+ Those setting out to develop their capacity must lead and drive assessment and formulation processes aiming at capacity development to such a degree that their ownership and commitment remain intact or are even boosted.
Without doubt, these guidelines have important implications for how we organise the capacity development of social partners.
88 ETF YEARBOOK 2011
CONCLUSIONS
In this chapter we have analysed the following questions: 1. How did social partners develop new knowledge in
the ETF peer learning exercise?
2. What are the possibilities for the ETF peer learning instrument as a learning tool and how can learning from experience and reflection become further developed in order to support the role of social partners in VET?
3. How can learning in networks be of most relevance for capacity development among social partners? As it has been presented in this chapter there are numerous reasons why the ETF peer learning exercise is a promising tool for the promotion of social partnership71
. During the implementation of the ETF peer learning exercise in three consecutive cycles (2006, 2007 and 2008) which sought approaches to the professional development of stakeholders playing a role in VET reforms, we found that facilitating learning from experience and everyday professional needs is a very promising approach. We found that if we applied the ‘policy problem solving’ approach, derived from real practice and placed within the real cycle of VET policy implementation, this would optimise the learning benefits for social partners engaged in ETF peer learning. They would acquire knowledge by observing and discussing similar national practices and would develop the capacity to reflect on their own situation through exposure to others.
Peer learning is a powerful learning tool but it demands substantial commitment and time from a limited group of peers without a linear learning outcome. The
effectiveness depends on the selection of peers that have
similar backgrounds and work situations but that also fulfil functions where they are able to actually transform their learning into practice in their own environment. The step from individual learning to organisational learning and action is a tremendous one. During the peer learning this awareness has been developed by the peers during the evaluation and dissemination phase of the project, but an impact analysis after some years has not yet been made and could offer more insight. The ETF will continue to use the peer learning instrument strategically within its multi-annual projects, bringing different stakeholders together in a learning environment and paying due attention to the follow-up of the peer learning,
emphasising that peer learning is not the final objective, but just an instrument to achieve broader goals. If this form of learning is extended to learning in national policy networks, it will allow for more structured capacity development among social partners. Capacity
development will be owned and managed by the social partners themselves. When policy networks which include social partners are closely involved in national policies and this involvement is placed within institutionalised structures, then more targeted and sustainable VET reform measures can be implemented. This road is not without challenges. Learning in
international and regional networks is different from learning in national networks. If peer learning is to be used in national networks for social partners, then its
methodology needs to be adjusted. And still, its eventual effect on reforms will be unknown. Decision making in national VET reform policy networks needs further analysis. How public policy knowledge is constructed is still an open question, not only for policy-makers and practitioners in public administration, but also for researchers in the field of public policy and governance.