This thesis explores shifting ideas of youth work, and the changing notions of professional competence that have shaped it since its emergence at the end of the last century. It begins by discussing Foucault's distinctive conception of power. This analysis is applied later in the thesis to youth work itself and to its forms of professional education and training. It is argued that modem professional practices illustrate the changing nature of disciplinary techniques in modem societies. These techniques are employed to discipline both professions themselves (by 'normalising' professional practices), and their client groups, and are also part of the contemporary problem of 'government'. Indeed, it is argued that models of professional education reflect the historically changing rationales on which British society has been organised and managed. The thesis identifies three phases of this: 'emergent welfarism', social government' or 'welfarism' and 'neo-liberalism. Drawing on a range of historical sources, a number of changing assumptions about young people in the context of youth work are identified, such as their characterisation as an inherently and naturally problematic social category. The 'discourse of adolescence' which draws on a range of knowledges about young people (from scientific to moral) is seen as providing a powerful justification for the expansion of youth work over the last hundred years or so. The youth worker's modem role in managing groups, offering counselling and acting as a 'broker' of social and moral knowledge is discussed. The progressive development of the professional education and training of youth workers since the 1930s is examined together with its curriculum content and the techniques and practices through which youth workers have been socialised into their occupational roles. After the initial tendency towards leadership training through apprenticeship, the professional model became organised on 'technical-rational' principles, with various 'techniques of the self' by which youth workers became disciplined into their professional identities (for example by 'surveillance' and 'confession'). Focus is given to the paradigmatic development and deployment of such techniques at the National College for the Training of Youth Leaders in the 1960s. The thesis concludes with an analysis of the intense criticism to which professional education and training in youth work has been subjected in the last decade, including the separation of theory and practice, unclear curricula, academic and professional elitism, and the marginalisation of learners' experience. The 'discourse of competency' is identified as being important in shaping current approaches to professional education and training in youth work. Finally, it is suggested that the emergent model of professional education is, ironically, characterised by an increasingly intense and invasive application of the techniques of disciplinary power identified earlier in the thesis. Competency practices we suggest facilitate the attempt to govern, professionals ahd professional practice. The thesis is broadly structured in four parts, and in the following way: Chapter 1 provides a broad introduction and context for the thesis. In Part One, Chapter 2 discusses Foucault's concept of power which informs the thesis. In Part Two, Chapter 3 discusses the managerial and disciplinary functions of the human service professions, providing a context for the subsequent analysis of youth work. Chapter 4 goes on to identify models of professional education in their political and social contexts and concludes with a discussion of the 'competency model'. In Part Three, Chapters 5 and 6 explore the distinctive contribution which youth work has made to the regulation and disciplining of young people. In these chapters links are made between broad political objectives and the evolving knowledge and practices of youth workers. In Part Four, Chapter 7 identifies the earliest attempts to identify and enhance competence through the training and education of youth workers. Chapter 8 explores youth work training in the 1960s and 1970s, identifying the essentially humanistic discourse which subsequently dominated youth work and the training of youth workers. In the context of political shifts beginning in the 1970s, Chapter 9 analyses the emergence of a 'discourse of competency' in youth work, and its challenge to the prevailing humanistic orthodoxy which characterised the professional education and training of youth workers. Finally, Chapter 11 draws general and particular conclusions to the thesis.

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Vorgeschichte Mit Vorträgen von Professor Werner Wuttke und Professor Ullrich Reinhold wurde in der Hochschulbibliothek das im Lichtschacht des Glasgebäudes installierte Foucaultsche Pendel übergeben. Dies war schon wegen der Seltenheit der Installation in der Region eine Besonderheit. Die gleichzeitig in Betrieb genommene Webcam ermöglicht nun die Beobachtung weltweit rund um die Uhr: http://www.fh-zwickau.de/index.php?id=701 http://141.32.4.72/view/view.shtml

Family planning initiatives have been critical to development strategies since the 1950s. Family planning has been justified on various grounds including its contribution to poverty alleviation, improved maternal and infant health and the advancement of women's rights and choices. More recently, the discourse of 'women's empowerment' has been used in the advocacy of family planning. This discourse integrates a number of earlier justifications for fertility control promoting family planning as a strategy to enhance women's access to higher standards of living and improved health. It associates family planning with advances in women's rights as individual citizens in 'modern' economies and their greater involvement in paid work. This thesis investigates whether this empowerment discourse is evident in family planning programmes in Fiji and its relationship to the socio-economic development of that country. Critical analyses of the operation of power, development strategies and western assumptions about family size, human rights and economic wellbeing inform this research. In particular, Foucault's concept of 'biopower' is used to analyse narratives about family planning articulated by health practitioners, women's rights activists and officials in the Ministry of Health. The analysis of key informants' statements is complemented by consideration of official statistics, and existing empirical data such as documents and pamphlets. The thesis argues that an empowerment discourse is strongly evident in Fiji with respect to the statements made by key informants and available written sources. It looks critically at the narratives that construct family planning as empowering for women, particularly the tropes of choice, health and full citizenship. Close analysis of these narratives demonstrate that the 'stories' uniformly position women as potentially empowered 'modern' subjects. However, critical analysis of these stories about choice, health and citizenship found that family planning strategies were sometimes disempowering. The generic stories embodied by the empowerment discourse did not allow for the diversity of women's needs; this finding supported critiques of one-size-fits-all development strategies. I demonstrate that while the empowerment discourse provided women with the opportunity to control their fertility, engage in paid work and be empowered, it simultaneously created new challenges and different forms of subordination. This thesis found that the empowerment discourse was an unmistakable example of biopower at work

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Miami University, Dept. of Educational Leadership, 2008. / Title from second page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 114-124).

Syftet med studien är att bidra med kunskap om hur barn positionerar varandra irollek och hur det skapar makt och motstånd. Syftet är även att bidra med kunskapom hur barns positioner skapar möjligheter och begränsningar i rollek. Studien tarinspiration ur Sheridan, Williams och Pramling Samuelssons (2014) artikel där detframkommer att barn i förskolan endast har strukturerade grupperingar 0.5–2 timmarom dagen. Det resulterar i många timmar om dagen i förskolan där barn självakonstruera sina grupper, även så kallad fri lek. Fri lek är en viktig del i förskolan ochskapar såväl möjligheter för barns utveckling likväl som det skapar begränsningarför barns utveckling. Skolverket (2022) lyfter att nästan 86% av Sveriges barn går iförskola där utbildningen utgår från Läroplanen för förskolan, Lpfö 18 (Skolverket2018) där ett mål om att alla barn ska få lika stort inflytande i utbildningen finnsskrivet. Studien har genomförts med ett baklängesarbete med kvalitativ ansatsgenom deltagande observationer som metod. Baklängesarbete innebar att syfte ochfrågeställningar omformulerades efter att resultatet var fastställt (Klingberg &Hallberg 2021). Deltagande observationer innebar att vi var delaktiga i barnens lekoch samtidigt förde fältanteckningar. Resultatet i studien analyseras utifrån KlaraDolks tolkning av Michel Foucaults teori med tre teoretiska begrepp. Studiensinsamlade empiri visade på att barn positionerar varandra i fyra olika positioner ideras rollek. Resultatet visade även på hur makt och motstånd konstitueras i barnsrollek och hur barns positioner skapar möjligheter men även begränsningar för barnsinflytande i rollek genom makt, motstånd och normer (Dolk 2013). Slutsatsen blevatt barns positioner har olika möjligheter till inflytande i rollekar som baseras påmaktstrukturer som ofta är synliga för barn, men osynliga för pedagoger. Dettaskapar både möjligheter och begränsningar för barn som pedagoger i förskolanmåste vara uppmärksamma på.