UFHRD Research Honorarium 2011-2012

Project Report

Project Title: National HRD: the potential utility of a governance perspective

Honorarium holder: Dr Leonard Holmes, University of Roehampton

Introduction

This report outlines the research activity undertaken for the project sponsored by UFHRD, and the current and planned outputs. The report will provide brief outline of the governance approach as applied to National HRD, examined in terms of a historical period in which UK policy underwent significant change. It will indicate the immediate outputs in terms of two conference papers, and currently planned outputs in respect of publications and online database. The report will then provide information on the activities undertaken for the project, and finally indicate ongoing work and possible future developments arising from the project.

Background

The proposal for the project originates from and was motivated by the historic and continuing difficulties that the UK has in achieving a settled and effective public policy on the skills development of the workforce. Whilst most discussions in this area focus on the varying particular policies that have been (or could/should be) put into place, the project was established more to examine aspects of policy-making itself. In particular, the continuing pattern of periodic changes in public policy, and particularly of the institutional structures, over more than half a century, was viewed as requiring examination and, if possible, explanation. Such examination and explanation may make a contribution to the development of conceptual and theoretical frameworks within the HRD field of enquiry, specifically in relation to the emerging body of work that is termed ‘National HRD’ (McLean, 2004). The project aimed to do so by framing the issues of concern as matters of governance, and considering how recent developments in the theory of governance might have utility in directing research attention and providing conceptual and theoretical tools for analysis of empirical phenomena.

The research project sought:

  • to explore the potential utility of a governance perspective for analysing national HRD policy developments within the UK;
  • to develop, within a governance perspective, an analytical framework for potential application in comparative studies in national HRD.

The governance perspective

This research project has adopted a governance perspective to examine UK policy in this area. The term ‘governance’ has been increasingly deployed in recent public policy theorising and research (see, eg, Bevir, 2009; Kooiman, 2003). Although the term ‘governance’ is used in other fields, particularly corporate governance and supra-national governance, it is the particular usage in respect of public policy matters that is relevant here. The term, ‘public governance’ (Bevir, 2007b), and ‘socio-political governance’ (Kooiman, 2003), are sometimes used for this area, although normally the simple term ‘governance’ is used as the context of use is clear.

The governance approach has developed over the past two to three decades, particularly in the context of political debates and changes. Neo-liberalist critiques of the perceived problems of overly-interventionist and bureaucratic state found expression in ‘New Public Management’, but the prescribed remedy in the form of greater reliance upon markets and quasi-markets appeared to fail to achieve the results expected by its proponents. These perceptions of both ‘government failure’ and ‘market failure’ were influential in development within the field of political studies of forms of theorising and analysis that emphasise the limitations of governments to direct and control economic and social affairs under conditions of complexity and uncertainty, whilst indicating that governments do have a role to play. Governing is viewed as processual and distributed, not narrowly centred on a single actor (the government or the state as an entity), nor on a single moment of policy decision that merely rolls out as intended. Various modes of governance are possible, in various ‘mixes’ mainly of hierarchies, markets and networks. These relate to and interact with each other in complex ways, and changes to any may have unintended consequences in another.

National HRD as a governance issue

The argument therefore is that the development of public policy in the UK on National HRD may be examined through the analytical ‘lens’ of governance perspective. The term ‘National HRD’ is taken here to encompass, and/or be (near) synonymous with previous and current terms such as ‘industrial training’ (eg in Acts of Parliament, and industrial training boards), ‘skills development’, ‘workforce development’ (as in, eg Performance and Innovation Unit, 2001). Rather than viewing the historical development of policy as ‘natural’ and/ or inevitable (‘whig history’), the governance perspective enables such policy development to be examined as the contingent outcome of a variety of influences, which themselves are constantly in flux. Government may play a role, and arguably can only play a role, in ‘steering’ the various processes and influences.

The history of National HRD policy in the UK over the past half century (since the Carr Committee established in 1956 to Leitch in 2006, and after) has certainly seen a shifting pattern. An initial period of apparently settled policy, instigated by the Conservative Government in the early 1960s, saw a governance pattern in which government-established but quasi-autonomous tri-partite (employer, trade union, educationist), sector-based industrial training boards (ITBs) set and had oversight of policy for their occupational sectors. However, within a decade the governance ‘landscape’ had significantly changed, albeit that ITBs still had a significant role. By the early 1980s, the neo-liberalist policies of the Thatcher-led Government had transformed the framework of governance in this area, espousedly towards a market-based approach (although this is debatable).

Since the 1980s, repeated interventions and changes in the framework of governance have been made, with no evidence of success either in terms of policies themselves or in terms the achievement of settled agreement amongst the various stakeholders whose active participation is required.

The project has sought to examine the critical period between the mid-1950s and the mid-1980s, through analysis of archival materials relating to various agencies that, according the governance perspective, would be engaged in this area of public policy. These include government departments and executive agencies, quasi-autonomous (non-departmental) government organisations, employer associations, trades unions, professional bodies and other ‘self-organising networks’ within civil society (eg BACIE).

The work so far has shown that the governance perspective does indeed have utility in exploring and explaining the development (and lack of development) in the UK of National HRD policy. Findings will be presented in the outputs arising from the work. More analysis in underway

Outputs

The project proposed to

  • Produce a conference paper (probably to HRD conference in 2012);
  • Produce one or more journal articles;
  • Create a database of source materials available from public archives.

A refereed conference paper has been prepared for the 13th International Conference on Human Resource Development Research and Practice Across Europe: ‘The future of HRD -2020 and beyond: challenges and opportunities’, 23rd-25th May 2012. The paper has the title:“Re-examining National HRD in the UK: the potential utility of a governance perspective”, and has been accepted for Stream 14, Vocational education, training and workplace learning.

A developmental paper has also been accepted for the annual conference of the British Academy of Management, in the Management and Business History track, with the title “Reversal of fortune? A governance perspective on the troubled history of skills training in the UK”.

It is planned to develop journal articles from both papers, the first to be submitted probably to Advances in Developing Human Resources, the second probably to Enterprise and Society.

The database of archival materials is currently under development. This will be online, for which the website domain nationalHRDarchives.org.ukhas been purchased. The website will be populated by:

  • information on the locations where relevant archival materials may be viewed;
  • guidance on undertaking archival research, specifically related to UK National HRD;
  • annotated listings of archive items;
  • bibliographic information on publications relating to National HRD.

It is intended that the annotated listings of archive items will be searchable through keyword search, as well as cross-referenced, to maximise its research usefulness.

Other outputs

In addition to the above planned outputs, a bid was submitted to the ESCR Research Seminars Competition, with the title ‘Between the governance of employment and the management of human resources’. This was submitted in collaboration with staff at Leicester University’s Centre for Labour Market Studies, Durham University Business School, and EdinburghNapier University’s EmploymentResearch Institute.

Although this was not successful, the feedback indicated that reviewers considered the basis of the proposed seminar series, that of bringing together two areas of enquiry that are normally separated (in terms of scholarly communities, theoretical perspectives publications etc, was ‘well conceived’, ‘valuable and interesting’. This suggests that there may be scope for organising one or more events to bring together relevant scholars. These might be free-standing (eg one-day seminars) or part of a conference, on the broader governance of employment/ management of human resources theme (as intended in the ESRC seminars bid), or more narrowly on the governance approach to National HRD.

Work undertaken

The project has built on the limited work previously undertaken and that formed the basis of the project proposal. The work undertaken during the project period has been three-fold:

  • Exploration of the governance literature;
  • Exploration of literature relating to UK National HRD;
  • Search, location and examination of archival materials.
Governance literature

A number of scholarly articles and books in the governance field had already been identified at the time of the proposal. Implicit in the project proposal was the view that the scholarly field had developed and was maturing. One marker of this is that Sage Publication had published ‘Key Concepts in Governance’ (Bevir, 2009), within the ‘Key Concepts’ series. During the project period, ‘The SAGE Handbook of Governance’ (Bevir, 2011) was also published, further confirming the status of the study of governance as an established field of scholarship.

Mark Bevir, author of the ‘key concepts’ book and editor of the SAGE Handbook is clearly a leading author in the field. Other texts located, that he has edited, including the Encyclopedia of Governance(Bevir, 2007a) and the 4-volume set of readings, Public Governance, in the SAGE Library of Political Science series (Bevir, 2007b).

Other key writers identified include Kooiman(eg Kooiman, 2003; 1993), Pierre (eg Pierre, 2000; Pierre & Peters, 2000), Rhodes (eg Rhodes, 1997, 2007),Stoker (eg Stoker, 1998, 1999, 2000). To these may be added a wide range of other scholars and their publications, particularly in academic journals. Those journals and relevant books (especially edited collections) are mainly in the fields of politics, political philosophy and sociology, political science. This has required search outside of University of Roehampton’s library resources. Copac has been particularly useful in locating texts deemed to be of interest, and proximity to other London universities, particularly London School of Economics, has enabled access within reasonable time and travel demands.

The sources located have formed the basis for examination of the governance perspective in relation to National HRD, as this has been and will be presented in literature review in conference papers and publications. It is also planned to produce an annotated bibliography, to be available online, to assist other researchers seeking to undertake work in this area. This would seem to be an important resource because of the dispersed nature of access to much of the literature, as indicated above.

Literature relating to UK National HRD

A number of key texts had already been identified at the time of the project proposal. These include:

Ainley, P. and Corney, M. (1990) Training for the Future: The Rise and Fall of the

ManpowerServices Commission

Evans, B. (1992) The Politics of the Training Market: From Manpower Services

Commission to Training and Enterprise Councils

Page, G. (1967) The Industrial Training Act and After

Perry, P. (1976) The Evolution of British Manpower Policy

Senker, P. (1992) Industrial Training in a Cold Climate

Sheldrake, J. and Vickerstaffe, S. (1987) The History of Industrial Training in Britain

Some of these (Page, 1967; Sheldrake and Vickerstaffe, 1987; Ainley and Corney, 1990; Evans, 1992) were personally held. Copies of the others were purchased at moderate cost, through search on Abebooks and Amazon websites.

A search on Copac shows these to be available at a relatively large number of libraries, including the Deposit Libraries. However, it is clear that many university libraries are likely to remove copies from stock, given their age and relatively low issue-rates. This is indicated by the fact that copies purchased were all ex-library stock.

Relevant articles in academic journals, and in practitioner journals (BACIE Journal/ Transitions, Training and Development, Personnel Management/ People Management) were also located. Again, these tend to be highly dispersed and, because most of those relevant to period that was the focus for the project pre-date digital publication, search must be done manually. Proximity of Roehampton to CIPD library at the headquarters in Wimbledon has been particularly useful.

It is planned that an annotated bibliography of such key sources be created and made available online.

Archival materials

A main element of the project has been to search for and locate key documents concerning (what was then termed) industrial training policy, during the period between the mid-1950s and the abolition of ITBs in the mid-1980s.

Of particular interest were documents produced by or for:

  • relevant government departments;
  • agencies established by government (Industrial Training Council, ITBs, Central Training Council, MSC);
  • employer associations, and particularly the CBI and its predecessors
  • trade unions, and particularly TUC;
  • BACIE, IPM and the Institution of Training Officers/ ITD.

The search for these has been conducted at

  • National Archives;
  • TUC Library and Archives, housed at London Metropolitan University;
  • Modern Records Centre, Warwick University;
  • CIPD Library, Wimbledon.

Note: I also have a personal archive, from a period of employment in an industrial training board and active trade union engagement during the early to mid-1980s. I held various officer positions in the branch of ASTMS covering professional training staff grades in seven industrial training boards, and took a lead role in campaigning against ITB closures and on subsequent policy issues. I was also a member of the union’s National Advisory Council on Training, and contributed to the development of union policy on workplace training agreements and training representatives.

A wide range of sources have been located, including reports, agendas and minutes of meetings, letters, memos, and sundry other items (including, for example, a note produced by a TUC officer covering catering arrangements for a conference of trade union members of Industrial Training Boards).

The materials are highly dispersed, often duplicate copies are held in different archives, and little exists in the way of systematic cataloguing. This makes search very time-consuming, particularly in terms of identifying what files may contain relevant and useful documents.

It should also be noted that there appear to be gaps in the archive records, particularly in respect of those for the industrial training boards and the Manpower Services Commission. In particular, search of catalogues for both National Archives and Modern Records Centre did not locate copies of the Manpower Services Commission report on a sector-by-sector review of training arrangements, and the sector reports, conducted in 1981 (ie immediately prior to the Government’s decision to close 17 of the 23 ITBs). A bound copy of these was located at the libraries of LSE (for loan) and Institute of Education (reference only), as well as the British Library and other deposit libraries.

All these materials pre-date digital records, so exist in the form of physical documents of varying quality in relation to text legibility, physical state of the paper, and method of storage. Thus, for example, records of meetings etc of BACIE, held at the Modern Records Centre, are copies of documents produced by a Gestetner or similar duplicator, sellotaped to the blank pages of a minutes book; the sellotape has deteriorated making page separation for clear reading almost impossible. Although these aspects provide fascinating insights into the office administrative technologies and practices of a now-bygone era, they do pose obstacles for ease-of-search.

A key dilemma when attending the archive centres was whether to use the time to study the documents and identify research-useful matters, or to take digital images of documents that appear to be relevant, then study these away from the archive centres. It was decided to take the latter course, in order to make best use of the time at the centres which, necessarily had to be done in half-day or whole-day periods given travel times involved (particularly to Modern Records Centre). The digital images have formed the basis for re-construction of documents, as sources of empirical data for analysis. However, these remain as images, rather than converted into digital text; there seems little prospect that optical character recognition software would be able to produce worthwhile conversion of such images, given the state of the documents, as indicated above.

The re-construction of relevant documents enables the development of a catalogue of archival sources. It is planned to make this available onlinefor other researchers.

Continuing and future work

The research work is on-going, and further outputs are anticipated as the conceptual theoretical framework provided by the governance perspectives is applied to later periods in the changing pattern of public policy in relation to National HRD in the UK.

In addition, it is anticipated that partners may be identified to undertake comparative analyses with other countries in respect of their policies for National HRD. Funding opportunities for such work are currently being explored, particularly through European Commission sources.