Abstract

Australian trade unions in the 1980s and 1990s sought to influence and guide the restructuring of vocational and workplace education policy, to widen participation in education and training, and establish partnership arrangements with government and business in order to promote international competitiveness.

Since the mid 1990s, however, the changed contours of the labour market, and a steady decline in both the numbers of union members and density rates, accompanied by legislative attacks on the right to organise, led many unions to shift their emphasis to organizing new members in order to stop the decline. Education was identified as being a critical factor in preparing unions to undertake this new effort and as a means of changing union culture.

This paper investigates the educational implications of trade unions shifting their focus to concentrate on organising for growth, and reports on new educational initiatives aimed at developing capacity, growth and new ways of knowing among officers and activists.