UNPLANNED BENEFIT - ON THE FUNCTIONAL TRA NSITION OF CONTINUING-EDUCATION AND RETRAINING

The results of a longitudinal study of the intended and unintended eff ects of continuing education and retraining indicate that their functi on in a societal context as well as their significance for individuals ' live is in a process of change. As opposed to commonly held disparag ing views of this form of education, which are also disseminated in pr ofessional literature, it is shown that a wide array of benefits for t he participants of continuing education and retraining could be drawn, although these usually differed from the intended consequences. While the AFG-promoted continuing education and retraining barely fulfils t he purposes for which they were designed (the reintegration of partici pants into active labour), they have taken on functions that give educ ation a new meaning. The more education is loosing its instrumental ch aracter, the more it becomes necessarily once again self-referential.