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Item Transitioning Vocational Education and Training in Africa: A Social Skills Ecosystem Perspective VET Africa 4.0 Collective.(Bristol University Press, 2021) McGrath, Simon; Openjuru, George Ladaah; Lotz-Sisitka, Heila; Allais, Stephanie; Zeelen, Jacques; Wedekind, Volker; Ramsarup, PreshaEditor's Preface This is the first volume for the Bristol Studies in Comparative and International Education (building upon the former Bristol Papers series) and one that clearly demonstrates our commitment to ‘critically engage with education and international development from a comparative and interdisciplinary perspective’. In content, the book is ground-breaking for the ways in which it challenges traditional, and often northern, conceptualizations of vocational education and training (VET); insists upon analysing both VET and work in broad, relational and inclusive ways; develops and applies original theoretical contributions drawn from political ecology; and moves beyond ‘extractive’ modalities of research in this important arena. In terms of ‘process’, the book has further distinction and originality due to the innovative ways in which the 20 core authors/researchers have combined to form the VET Africa 4.0 Collective and wrestled with the decolonial challenges and dynamics of coproduction and joint authorship within the context of an externally funded international Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) partnership. For those interested in learning from, and advancing, more equitable international research partnerships, this book has much to offer readers across multiple fields and disciplines. The book is structured around three sections, the first of which establishes the historical and theoretical context (Chapters 1–4) while introducing the ‘social ecosystems for skills’ model that underpins the overall framework for the analysis. Section 2 (Chapters 5–8) develops and expands this model through a detailed and critically reflexive examination of the empirical data embedded within four contextually grounded South African and Ugandan VET case studies. Section 3 (Chapter 9) reflects upon the implications of the overall study for future research, policy and practice; and an important and insightful ‘Afterword’ reflects on the collaborative, multilevel research and writing process in ways that deserve close attention. This is a complex and sophisticated analysis with theoretical and empirical depth that provides an invaluable resource for all concerned with the future of VET policy, practice and research worldwide. It is a collective book that reimagines more democratic and relational futures for VET, challenges dominant orthodoxies, engages with the implications of both decolonization and climate resilience for the future of skills development, and interrogates the multiple power dynamics involved in advancing innovative international research partnerships within, and beyond, the VET arena. To cite the authors own words: ‘As university researchers, we must find ways of balancing the immediacy of the funded project and the need for stronger and longer lasting bonds in the locations in which we research, while also forming new, oftentimes nontraditional, relations across our institutions and our related partner networks’ (afterword). For these reasons, it is hard to imagine a more appropriate volume for the launch of our renewed book series with Bristol University Press. I am, therefore, more than pleased to recommend this work to readers interested in the contemporary challenges faced by VET in Africa and worldwide; and, most importantly, to all engaged with the theoretical and epistemological implications of decolonization for interdisciplinary research, comparative studies and international development.Item Vocational education and training for African development: a literature review(Informa-Taylor & Francis, 2019-11-05) McGrath, Simon; Ramsarup, Presha; Zeelen, Jacques; Wedekind, Volker; Allais, Stephanie; Lotz-Sisitka, Heila; Monk, David; Openjuru, George; Russon, Jo-AnnaThe SDGs mark the clearest global acceptance yet that the previous approach to development was unsustainable. In VET, UNESCO has responded by developing a clear account of how a transformed VET must be part of a transformative approach to development. It argues that credible, comprehensive skills systems can be built that can support individuals, commu nities, and organisations to generate and maintain enhanced and just livelihood opportunities. However, the major current theoretical approaches to VET are not up to this challenge. In the context of Africa, we seek to address this problem through a presentation of literatures that contribute to the theorization of this new vision. They agree that the world is not made up of atomized individuals guided by a “hidden hand”. Rather, reality is heavily structured within political economies that have emerged out of contestations and compromises in specific historical and geographical spaces. Thus, labor markets and education and training systems have arisen, characterized by inequalities and exclusions. These specific forms profoundly influence individuals’ and communities’ views about the value of different forms of learning and working. However, they do not fully define what individuals dream, think and do. Rather, a transformed and transformative VET for Africa is possible.Item Revisiting VET research paradigms: Critical perspectives from the South(Journal of Vocational Education & Training, 2023-11-16) Monk, David; Molebatsi, Palesa; McGrath, Simon; Metelerkamp, Luke; Adrupio, Scovia; Openjuru, George; Robbins, Glen; Tshabalala, ThembaThis paper reflects on a large multisite funded VET research project conducted by a large and diverse research team. Reflecting on two of our case studies, from Uganda and South Africa, we consider both the need for broadening the VET research agenda to incorporate more research on non-formal sites of vocational learning and work, and the imperative of continued critical reflection on modalities of researching the formal sphere. What we offer is a very fallible attempt to open up the debate about the future of VET research further through, we believe, a critical reading of some of our failures as well as successes in trying to ground our research ethically, ontologically and axiologically and not just methodologically. We advocate, where possible, a radical embeddedness of VET research in communities, whilst acknowledging that this is applicable only to some parts of a comprehensive VET research agenda. We also acknowledge that employers and the state are also legitimate stakeholders who should be part of research but point to the need for a more critical reflection into the patterns of power implicit in researching with/on these constituencies. We believe that our reflection on our successes and failures in these two cases and the project as a whole offers useful provocations regarding ways of making VET research more reflective of diverse settings, less extractive from those being researched and more equal in the participation of members of the research team from the South