UDK 316+32(063)

Un 150
Uncertain Transformations New Domestic and International Challenges
Proceedings of the International Conference, Riga, November 9-11, 2006
Rga, Latvijas Universitte, 2006. 390 lpp.
Riga, University of Latvia, 2006. 390 pages
International Conference organised by
University of Latvia
Faculty of Social Sciences
Advanced Social and Political Research Institute
and
Strategic Analysis Commission under the Auspices
of the President of the Republic of Latvia
Editors: Prof. aneta Ozolia and Dr. Nils Muinieks
Editorial Board:
Prof. aneta Ozolia, Head, Department of Political Science, Faculty of Social
Sciences, University of Latvia
Dr. Nils Muinieks, Director, Advanced Social and Political Research Institute,
University of Latvia
Assist. prof. Andris Runcis, Department of Political Science, Faculty of Social
Sciences, University of Latvia
Prof. Aija Zobena, Head, Department of Sociology, Faculty of Social Sciences,
University of Latvia
Prof. Aleksander Surdej, Cracow University of Economics
Dr. Lassi Heininen, University of Lapland
Project Coordinators:
Inga Kanasta and Ieva Zlemeta
Latvian language editor: Vija Kaepe
Lay-out: Arnis aksti
Cover design: Ieva Tiltia
All the papers published in the present volume have been reviewed.
No part of the volume may be reproduced in any form without the written
permission of the publisher.
Latvijas Universitte, 2007
ISBN 9984-802-58-2



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Education and Its Consequences in a

Changing World: A Challenge to the
Knowledge Society
Juris Tipa
Student, University of Latvia
The homepage of Latvias Ministry of Welfare states that work is one of the
most important human activities which provides the means for survival, creates the
the foundation for creative thinking, self-realisation and social contacts.1 I doubt
that anyone would deny this statement. I also doubt that someone would deny the
importance of education as organised knowledge contributing to the development
of the human personality. We could assume that both work and education determine
the social value of people in our society and determine life opportunities and the
quality of life. Inadequate or insufcient education can become a signicant barrier
for occupying a good position in the labour market, but the absence of work or low
paid work can negatively affect a persons material situation and psychological wellbeing.
But what is education really and what does it give to us? How and by whom is
education shaped? How is education related to the labour market? What consequences
and risks does it involve and how should we deal with them? These are the questions
that I will try to answer in my essay. To achieve these objectives, I will use the
example of the generation in Latvia which is currently aged between 4555 years.
If we assume that there is a certain circulation of capital in the labour market,
then education should also be perceived as a form of capital. Cultural capital is the
famous term in sociology widely described by French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu.
He described three forms of capital economic, social and cultural. Economic
capital mostly refers to economic resources, social capital to group membership,
relationships and social networks created by people, and cultural capital can be
seen in knowledge and skills. According to Bourdieu, cultural capital exists in three
forms: embodied (a persons character and way of thinking formed by socialisation),
objectied (things which are owned, such as scientic instruments or works of art)
and institutionalised (educational qualications and their value can be measured
only in relationship to the labour market). Thus, below, I discuss cultural capital
in its institutionalised form. Bourdieu notes that cultural capital can be acquired and
distributed through the family and educational system, so the family is the indirect
reproducer of state and governmental values, and formal mass education is the direct
reproducer of these institutionalised values. Moreover, Bourdieu implies that cultural

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capital can be converted into economic capital.2 This means that certain knowledge,
education or skills can be converted into economical means, for example, into a
higher income, a better job, etc.
Though Forms of Capital was written by Bourdieu more than 20 years ago,
other authors have elaborated on the concept of cultural capital in similar ways
more recently. In advanced societies, cultural capital is the counterpart of economic
capital. Economic capital is not only shares and bonds and material goods. It is
also know-how on how to handle monetary assets and how to behave in the world
of corporations and nance. 3 From an economic viewpoint, the most important
function of universal education is that it provides the economic subsystem with
efcient and productive labour forcesSchools (used here as a generic term for all
levels of formal education) are thus thought of as the great socialisers.4 This means
that we are all carriers and reproducers of cultural capital deposited by education.
Further, I will describe a particular generation in Latvia in the context of cultural
capital and the labour market. My sybject is people who gained education during
the Soviet Union (in the Latvian SSR) in the beginning of the 1980s and afterwards
had to face the labour market in an independent capitalist Latvia after the collapse
of the USSR in 1991. These persons are primarily in the age group 4550 years
old. As theoretical background for this description, I will use a publication of Ritma
Rungule and Ilze Koro!eva Old education in new conditions. In this publication,
the authors describe longitudinal research on people who graduated from secondary
schools in the Latvian SSR during the period 19831985. The study stressed their
further education choices and pursued their success in the labour market thereafter.
The authors described the education system in the Soviet Union as highly centralised
(as we know, the economy was highly centralised as well in the USSR), standardised
and highly regimented. A rapid increase in the spread of secondary education resulted
in a decrease in quality due to its mass character. On the other hand, universities
were not able to matriculate all the people who wanted to. Education was focused
on meeting the needs of the country or society in general and not on the value that
the individual could receive from education personally. Education was under the
complete control of the government and was used for the needs of government. Often
people were prepared to work only in a certain factory or certain job. Every ministry
(or economic department) tried to open its own secondary specialised education
or schools (PTU, technical college) to provide itself with a labour force. Students
who graduated from these medium specialised education schools had fewer
opportunities to enter university because of the narrow education they received in
specialised education schools. The education system resulted in relatively young
(1415) individuals in the Soviet Union being divided into educational paths which
determined their future careers.
According to Rungule and Koro!eva, the majority of people in the Latvian
SSR were involved in medium specialised education and a minority of them
continued education in independent Latvia.5 This means that persons who received
medium specialised education (both in PTU or a Technical college) in the Soviet
Union received knowledge (usually technical) that was meant for a narrow range
of functions within the plans of the regime and government. Education lost its long
term value and became usable only for here and now actions. And with the same



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educational and labour experience background they had and still have to face new
education and labour market strategies in independent Latvia.
After the fall of the USSR, education became a part of the free market. A
majority of the factories for people educated in medium specialised institutions
were shut down or went bankrupt. Skills these people received during their Soviet
education period became inapplicable. This generation had to resocialise in terms
of the knowledge and qualities demanded in the labour market which were not
topical before (language skills, information technologies, client service skills, etc).
Of course this caused a high rate of unemployment and low paid jobs among this
generation. As Hans Melberg suggests, capitalism should be seen as a creative
system because new inventions, new technologies, changing preferences and
external shocks are constantly changing the structure of the markets.6 When new
technologies are invented there is no demand anymore for workers who were doing
certain functions before the invention of a particular technology. This also pertains
to knowledge before the invention, a specic kind of knowledge was needed to
perform the necessary functions. After the invention, different knowledge is needed
for operating with new technologies. For those whose knowledge is not needed
anymore in the labour market, gaining the demanded new knowledge (skills,
education etc.) is becoming more and more complicated. For many, this is a serious
tragedy, as he or she cannot earn the necessary means for surviving. Cultural capital
earned has devaluated; in other words, the bankruptcy of factories and the regime
also bankrupted the cultural capital of many people. People who are about 4550
years old and older are the most vulnerable social group in the labour market. If they
lose a job, it is very hard to nd a new one because of lack of knowledge or cultural
capital in demand.7
This example demonstrates the statement of Ulrich Beck that: Risks have
become an intellectual and political web across which tread many strands of
discourse relating to the slow crisis of modernity and industrial society.8
Who could predict that the Soviet Union would fall? Who could predict that
what we learned and practiced for decades would become inapplicable after a year?
If we are not aware of the presence of risks, it doesnt mean they are not there.
In terms of modernity, changes that occurred after the fall of the USSR resulted
in an individualisation of social agents. Every person not only became able to
completely make his own social biography, but was even forced to do so. Risks that
are attached to this process were redistributed from the governmental level (as in the
Soviet Union) to the individual level (as in independent Latvia). According to Beck,
this is one of the indicators of labour market "exibility redistribution of risks
away from the state and the economy towards the individual.9 Beck continues that
the labour market in a free market economy functions as a motor of individualisation
or individualisation of social inequality. People demand the right to develop their own
perspective on life and act upon it. Sudden individualisation can be insecure or can
cause a wave of unemployment. Individualisation is directly related to risk because
it means separation of the individual from traditional support networks (community,
family) which could be seen also as habitual support networks. Everyone who
enters the labour market has to face its three dimensions education (choosing
and planning ones educational course to became a producer of individual labour),

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mobility (to escape economic ruin a person is forced to take charge of his own life,
which means that a person is removed from traditional patterns and arrangements)
and competition (rests upon the interchangeability of qualications and thereby
compels people to advertise the individuality and uniqueness of their work and their
own accomplishments which results in individualisation among equals).10 As we
can see, these conditions are not similar to the ones that were signicant for labour
markets in the Soviet Union. Mobility and competition in general were indirect
and mild because people were prepared to work in a certain position. It excludes
signicant upward career mobility (direct upward mobility in the Soviet Union was
possible only within the Party and Unions, as business activities were illegal) and
decreases competition (as noted before, in a centralised system there were more or
less as many professionals prepared as were needed).
Conditions we have to face in the labour market also determine our behaviour
according to our culture. This has also been indirectly described by Beck:
Unemployed people have a lot of time on their hands and nancially are very
insecure. But paradoxically, their receipt of unemployment benets obliges them to
do nothing. They might be compared to thirsty people who have promised not to
drink one drop of extra water because they are ofcially given one glass a day to
moisten their parched throat. Otherwise they are social cheats, whose transgression
is harmful to the public good.11
However, I would like to argue that unemployment benets dont inescapably
oblige an unemployed person to do nothing. The choice between passivity and
activity is determined by several factors - how else can we explain that one person
is passive and does nothing, but another is actively looking for a job despite the
unemployment benets. 12 It depends primarily on cultural capital, but of course
also on other forms of capital mentioned by Bourdieu. For example, if a person is
accustomed to double-morals since Soviet times, this habit became a part of his
cultural capital. On the other hand, if we look into unemployment statistics of Latvia,
we see that the highest unemployment is for the age group 4560 years.13 This is
precisely the generation which graduated from secondary schools in the Latvian SSR
around the beginning of the 1980s. The most active applicants for unemployment
benets are also from this age group. It is no secret that people also have unofcial
jobs in order to have a double income (the welfare benet plus the unofcially
earned income).14 This position is understandable, because the way these people
were living was suddenly no longer possible and they had to adapt to completely
new rules of the game. This caused signicant psychological discomfort, and there
is a lack of faith in the new system perhaps in 10 years there will be a need to
resocialise again. From the here and now education in the Soviet regime, people
of that generation are practicing a here and now labour market strategy. By this
I mean their emphasis on any kind of immediate income, ignoring the long term
perspectives, credit ratings, etc. Here again we can see the effect of cultural capital.
Looking at the current situation, it seems that higher education has taken the
place held by medium specialised education during the Soviet period. Because of
the easy accessibility of higher education (student credits, scholarships, etc.), it has
partly lost its great importance in upward mobility and has turned into an institution
which students continue after their graduation from secondary schools.15 What does



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this mean and where is it taking us? I would say that it is a new risk to face, and
we are facing it already as a great divide between formal knowledge (theory) and
particular skills (experience). It is quite common today for young people to become
unemployed after graduating from university because they have no work experience
(a good CV) which is demanded in the labour market. Paradoxically, these
youngsters are in the same situation as the Soviet generation previously described.
Of course both cases entail a social tragedy, but there is also a difference in most
cases, unemployed university graduates are treated in the labour market as a
social risk group, but people aged 4555 (and older) are not, despite the fact that
unemployment rates can be similar. This Soviet generation is like a dying plant,
and it seems that society is counting on a demographic wave to wash away this
generation with its cultural capital. I think it is even more tragic, the emphasis is on
the young generation, but the elderly people are almost taken to the forest, as the
folk saying goes, to get rid of them.
Economic needs determine the educational system.16 This statement could be
the conclusion of this paper, as in both the Soviet Union and independent Latvia the
economy is one of the key factors determining the education system. In a centralised
regime, education is fully planned, but in a capitalist regime it is based on freedom
of choice and free market self-regulation (which limits the freedom of choice
at the same time). People in both systems face risks, as the regime can change or
the economic situation or market demands can change. Any of these changes affect
cultural capital in the form of new demands for knowledge and skills. Education and
added cultural capital is one of the main determinants of opportunities in the labour
market. Of course, we are also dependent on our social networks (social capital)
and wealth (economic capital), but speaking in general terms, our opportunities are
based in cultural capital. As I emphasised about the current period, opportunities are
particularly based on knowledge and skills in the form of cultural capital.
As elsewhere in the world, Latvia has gone through cultural capital transformation
primarily caused by technological development and political change. The fast
development of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has brought
about deep changes in our way of working and living, as the widespread diffusion
of ICT is accompanied by organisational, commercial, social and legal innovations.
Our society is now dened as the Information Society, a society in which low-cost
information and ICT are in general use, or as the Knowledge(-based) Society, to
stress the fact that the most valuable asset is investment in intangible, human and
social capital and that the key factors are knowledge and creativity.17
What kind of issues need to addressed in this changing world full of risks?
Currently, the concept of life-long education is as topical as ever, as is e-learning,
distance learning, continuing education, correspondence courses, etc. Basically
it is anti-theory and anti-practice to say that You cant teach an old dog new
tricks.18 Education shouldnt be perceived and treated as something age, time
or institutionally limited, but more as a continuing process. In Bourdieus terms,
we could say there is a need for permanently renewable cultural capital. Lifelong
learning as an approach which is based on awareness of changes, preparedness, and
"exibility. If the labour market is "exible, its clients should also be "exible.

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Paraphrasing Beck19:Labour market "exibility means: Cheer up, your skills and
knowledge are not absolute, and no one can say what you must learn in order to be
needed in the future.

3&'&3&/$&4
Beck, Ulrich. Brave New World of Work (Polity Press, 2000).
Beck, Ulrich. Risk Society: Towards New Modernity (Sage, 1993).
Bornschier V., Herkenrath M., Knig C., The Double Dividend of Expanding Education for
Development, International Sociology, Vol. 20(4), (December 2005), pp. 506529.
Bourdieu, Pierre. Forms of Capital, 1986, from http://www.viet-studies.org/Bourdieu_capital.
htm, viewed on 25.10.2006.
Broady D., What Is Cultural Capital? Comments on Lennart Rosenlunds Social Structures
and Change, 2001, at
http://folk.uio.no/potnes/6.%20Broady.pdf , viewed on
25.10.2006.
Melberg, Hans. Unemployment: Micro- or Macro-theories?, 1992, http://www.geocities.
com/hmelberg/papers/921120.htm viewed on 27.02.2006, viewed on 25.10.2006.
Rungule, Ritma and Koro!eva, Ilze. Vec# izgl$t$ba jaunajos apst#k!os in Sabiedr!bas
p"rmai#as Latvij" , ed. Aivars Tabuns, (R$ga: Jumava, 1998), p. 255 277.
Tabuns, Aivars. Publiskie intelektu#!i, Kult$ras Diena, 16.04.2005, pp. 1617.
Tipa, Juris. Rigas unemployed aged 45 55 attitudes towards education, unpublished term
paper, 2005.
European Union homepage of Knowledge society http://ec.europa.eu/employment_social/
knowledge_society/index_en.htm, viewed on 27.10.2006.
State agency of employment of Latvia, Report on employment statistics, http://www.nva.
lv/index.php?cid=1&mid=109&txt=104&from=0, viewed on 15.10.2006.
http://www.lm.gov.lv/?sadala=253 Homepage of Welfare ministry of Republic of Latvia,
viewed on 27.10.2006.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifelong_learning Lifelong learning, Wikipedia online encyclopedia, viewed on 27.10.2006.

&/%/05&4
1

Homepage of the Ministry of Welfare of the Republic of Latvia athttp://www.lm.gov.

lv/?sadala=253, viewed on 27.10.2006.
Pierre Bourdieu, , Forms of Capital (1986), from http://www.viet-studies.org/Bourdieu_
capital.htm, viewed on 25.10.2006.
D. Broady, What Is Cultural Capital? Comments on Lennart Rosenlunds Social
Structures and Change, (2001) from http://folk.uio.no/potnes/6.%20Broady.pdf , viewed
on 25.10.2006.
V. Bornschier, M. Herkenrath, C. Knig, The Double Dividend of Expanding Education
for Development, from International Sociology, Vol 20(4) December 2005: pp. 506
529.
Ritma Rungule and Ilze Koro!eva, Vec# izgl$t$ba jaunajos apst#k!os,inSabiedr!bas
p"rmai#as Latvij" , ed. Aivars Tabuns (R$ga: Jumava, 1998), pp. 255 277.
Hans Melberg, Unemployment: Micro or Macro theories? (1992) http://www.
geocities.com/hmelberg/papers/921120.htm, viewed on 25.10.2006.
Juris Tipa, Rigas unemployed aged 45 55 attitudes towards education, unpublished
term paper, University of Latvia, 2005.



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Ulrich Beck, Risk society: Towards new modernity, (Sage publishers: 1993), p. 3.
Ulrich Beck, Brave new world of work (Polity Press: 2000), p. 3.
Ulrich Beck, Risk Society: Towards New Modernity (Sage: 1993), pp. 9294.
Ulrich Beck, Brave New World of Work (Polity Press: 2000), p. 90.
Juris Tipa, Rigas unemployed aged 45 55 attitudes towards education, unpublished
term paper, University of Latvia, 2005.
Report on employment statistics by the State agency of employment of Latvia,
available at http://www.nva.lv/index.php?cid=1&mid=109&txt=104&from=0, viewed
on 15.10.2006.
Juris Tipa, Rigas unemployed aged 45 55 attitudes towards education, unpublished
term paper, 2005.
Aivars Tabuns, Publiskie intelektu#!i, Kult$ras Diena, 16.04.2005, pp. 1617.
J. Demaine, Contemporary Theories in The Sociology of education (Macmillian Press:
1991), p. 121.
http://ec.europa.eu/employment_social/knowledge_society/index_en.htm European
Union homepage of Knowledge society, viewed on 27.10.2006.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifelong_learning - Lifelong learning, Wikipedia online
encyclopedia, viewed on 27.10.2006.
Beck U., 2000, Brave new world of work (Polity press), p. 3.