The European Union (EU) and the neighbouring countries with which it co-operates comprise a large, economically and developmentally diverse community. This natural variation means that the assembly of data-based research informing policy in the fields of adult education and lifelong learning (LLL) can often be constrained.
That’s why, says Gina Ebner, Secretary General of the European Association for the Education of Adults, policy making shouldn’t be seen as solely dependent on data collection or research studies.
“Of course policy makers can draw on the comprehensive data of the likes of the Adult Education Survey and the Labour Force Survey, and the PIACC survey of adult skills. However, we should be careful of trying to reinvent the wheel,” says Ebner. “Throughout the EU, the countries that have good policies are also increasingly making use of peer learning to develop evidence-based policies that rely on benchmarking to assess performance.”
Best learning is between peers
This is an approach that is supported by experience of Shamshod Yunusov, Programme Manager of Uzbekistan’s Yuksalish national movement, a non-governmental organisation set up as part of a state programme to promote dialogue between government, business and Civil Society Organisations (CSOs). While data-based research is very important for the correct ‘diagnosis’, says Yunusov, “the best learning practice is between peers, since the speed of technological development makes it difficult for theory to keep up with practice and vice versa”.
But when a country is at war, it is particularly difficult for the usual mechanisms of knowledge transfer and the cross-pollination of ideas to happen. This means, says Mykyta Andreev, Executive Director of the Ukrainian Association of Adult Education and head of the Ministry of Education and Science’s Public Council, that the UAAE — which encompasses 80 Ukrainian CSOs — has severely limited scope to mobilise the kind of data feedback loops that ideally should link research and policy.
Andreev notes the irony of Ukraine’s first comprehensive adult education/life-long learning Bill, spearheaded by the UAAE and other actors, being put before the country’s parliament on the exact same day in February that the Russians invaded. Under such circumstances, although the legislation is underpinned by a couple of large pre-war Ukrainian studies, ongoing research is made impossible by the fighting and the closure or destruction of supplemental data registers throughout the country.
This also means Government statistical resources are limited, with most of the data underpinning policy coming from independent institutions and the good statistical banks that have been compiled over time by the CSOs.
In-country financing is a constraint
A further constraint is finances, said Andreev. At an implementation level, the required legislative underpinning that would enable LLL initiatives to access local authority funding are not yet in place. At a policy level research studies and data collection, as well as policy input from CSOs is heavily dependent on financial support from the outside, from the EU and multinational organisations.
“Ukrainian CSOs are powerful and have a strong tradition of self-organisation. In many ways, they are, in my opinion, better organised than the business or state sectors,” says Andreev. While there are the same problems that many countries experience with bureaucratic slowness to implement, we actually have high levels of co-operations with parliamentarians and government policy makers,”
CSOs need to collaborate better
However, the Uzbek experience, says Yunusov, is that while CSOs “are now very active in bringing out the voices of their groups, there are just a few big ones that are strong enough to be sitting at one table with the decision-makers” to formulate policy. If data-based or evidence-based research is to be made attractive in a limited resource setting, these CSOs have to embrace partnerships with other NGOs, not “consider them competitors”.
Whatever national strategy develops out of this, will in turn “be promoted by CSOs through their daily work”. “Luckily many NGOs are now choosing the path of promoting their mandate and voices of their target groups through addressing the poverty issues via training, non-academic education, obtaining skills, and capacity building,” says Yunusov.
Similarly, Constanta Dohotaru, one of the leaders of the Moldova for Peace Initiative, an umbrella organisation of five NGOs that is currently working with the influx of refugees — 70% of whom are women, children and the elderly — fleeing the war in Ukraine, stresses that CSOs need to learn to collaborate better with one another, as well as with government.
Although CSOs have received some government grants, they are almost entirely dependent on international agencies and philanthropic organisations for financing. It is a “tough process”, made more difficult by Moldova’s shortage of skilled human resources.
“We are totally independent of government control which gives us the possibility of being really critical when necessary. “That’s a plus and minus,” says Dohotaru. It can at times mean that both actors feel unaccountable to the other.
However, the refugee crisis has also compelled the government and CSOs to collaborate constantly, with the CSOs providing grassroot feedback on issues like accommodation, job opportunities and training. “Sometimes our input is well received and acted upon immediately. Sometimes not.”
But it does mean that policy makers are getting to understand and appreciate what the CSOs are doing. “It’s a lifelong learning process for all the actors,” says Dohotaru.
/by Stillwords/
Have a look @ our last conference: Focus on the Civil Society Organisations in the ETF-LLLP joint conference | Open Space (europa.eu)
Thanks to Dohotaru, Younusov, and Andreev, for sharing such an interesting insight on CSOs and evidence-based policy in HCD! Best Learning is in the peer network, I agree.
Please log in or sign up to comment.