Page 17 - Education in a Digital World

4 Developing a Global Perspective

particular, globally networked economic power. This is certainly reflected in the
‘network enterprise’ of modern multinational corporations, based as they are on
the networking of labour in the form of ‘flexi-workers’ and ‘self-programmable
labour’ alongside the distribution of what Hardt and Negri (2005) term ‘immaterial
goods’. Indeed, economic commentators over the past thirty years have charted the
rise of so-called ‘immaterial’ economies, built around global flows of ‘weightless’
products and services such as accounting, legal services, insurance, management
consulting, training, marketing and software development (see Miller 2011). This
new world economic order is seen to be founded upon globally networked processes
that are fast-changing, flexible and based around ephemeral rather than material
‘content’.
This, then, brings us to the second point of wider significance for this book – i.e. the
ever-increasing influence of information and knowledge in contemporary society.
Indeed, the spectre of the ‘knowledge economy’ could be said to underpin everything
that has been discussed so far in this chapter (and indeed everything that will be
discussed throughout the rest of the book). In simple terms, the ‘knowledge economy’
refers to the increasing significance of the production and manipulation of information
and knowledge at the expense of the production of physical goods and services. As
Chakravartty and Sarikakis (2006, p.22) argue, the ‘knowledge economy’“symbo-
lises a transition from the manual/machine-assisted production line of material
things to an abstract, placeless interaction between human and electronic brains for
the production of services”. Following this logic, the production and distribution of
knowledge and information is now a core component of contemporary economic
growth and, therefore, changes in employment. As a consequence, the capacity
of organisations and individuals to engage successfully in learning, training and
‘reskilling’ processes becomes an important determinant of economic performance
(Pantzar 2001).
Indeed, the knowledge economy thesis implies that individuals and organisations
face major educational challenges in adjusting to these new circumstances. Thus it is
recognised by policymakers and employers alike that the nature of access to educational
opportunities has implications not only for general economic competitiveness, but
also for the employability of individuals and the consequent impacts on their stan-
dard of living. A dominant view has emerged in many countries and regions that
the effective organisation of learning opportunities is a crucial driver of economic
growth and – it follows – social cohesion. The emphasis on individuals within the
knowledge economy model reflects a ‘human capital’ model where individuals
participate in learning according to their calculation of the net economic benefits to
be derived from education and training (Becker 1975). As Brown et al. (2008, p.132)
reason, the essence of this human capital approach is that “income reflects the level
of skill”. Given the prevailing view of contemporary economic change as predicated
upon knowledge-based forms of production, human capital theory sees individual
workers seeking to participate in education throughout their lifetimes in order to
capitalise upon the labour-market benefits that should result from skills renewal and