Austerity and On-the-job Vocational Learning: Power, Technology and the ‘Knowledge Economy’ Reconsidered

This article seeks to contribute to an understanding of questions regarding on-the-job vocational learning, power, and technological change in the context of dynamic notions of knowledge economy and contemporary public sector austerity in the West based on a “mind in political economy” approach inspired by the Cultural Historical Activity Theory tradition. It draws on recently completed analysis of public sector human services work (welfare benefits delivery work in Ontario, Canada) based on a seven year mixed-methods study (learning life-history interviews n=75; survey n=339). It seeks to explain the emergence of difference between the on-the-job vocational learning of newcomers and veteran workers. The conclusion suggests that structural changes to economies, sectors and organizations, often revolving around new forms of advanced technology, may initiate a process of contestation, appropriation, accommodation and consent that must be actively accomplished by inter-generational dynamics amongst workers within activity.