Progress towards a learning society? Patterns of lifelong learning

This paper is set against the current background of policies designed to in crease and support lifelong learning in the UK, leading to the establishmen t of a 'learning society'. The interim results of a large-scale study of pa tterns of participation in post-compulsory education and training are used to suggest that progress towards such a society is uneven and far from cert ain. Increasing full-time continuous participation by itself does not lead to patterns of lifelong learning, nor does simply increasing the number of existing opportunities or reducing the impact of barriers to participation (however laudable these objectives may be). More research is needed to unco ver the specific determinants of participation in various types of formal l earning as they are identified here, but it is already clear that while som e forms of participation are susceptible to policies of widening access, ot hers are less so. The latter may only be significantly altered by adjustmen ts to the inequalities in society, but unless we are clear which is which t his new round of policies on lifelong learning may be directed at the wrong target.