Adult Education Goes to Market: An Ethnographic Case Study of the Restructuring and Reculturing of Adult Education

Abstract

The restructuring of adult education in Göteborg was first initiated experimentally with respect only to SFI education (an education in beginning Swedish for ethnic minorities living in Sweden). This was done on the basis of decisions in the Göteborg Municipal Council in 1999. But restructuring came into full force for all municipal adult education in the Göteborg municipality later in 2002, after the completion of the National Adult Education Initiative (AEI). The restructuring processes followed guidelines for franchise in the public sector as per the 1992 Purchasing Act and had consequences for all education suppliers, but in particular one of them, Studium AB. This was a company created and owned by the Göteborg Metropolitan Council that had been established in order to safeguard the provision of the municipally owned adult education public service previously known as Komvux. This ‘humanist’ form of comprehensive adult education has a strong history in Sweden, within the provision of adult education on a ‘folk-home’ basis. Studium AB had been the single largest provider of adult education in Göteborg up until the franchise but lost its mandate in the tendering processes. Although it concentrates mainly on ‘talkdata’ the present article has been developed from an ongoing ethnographic case study of the effects of restructuring in Göteborg.