Universitetet i Agder: UiA Journal System
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Editorial: Ten Volumes of Dialogue
No full text“Why a European Journal of Workplace Innovation?” this was the question posed in the journal’s first editorial. The answer offered was both practical and conceptual: to create a space where different traditions of research and practice could meet. Since then, the European Journal of Workplace Innovation has published seventeen issues across ten volumes. Hosted by the University of Agder, it has remained committed to that original purpose: to contribute to knowledge “that unfolds within some kind of totality, a totality that no researchapproach can claim to fully overview” (Pålshaugen, 2015, p. 10). This editorial vision has also consistently emphasised pluralism over orthodoxy, aiming “not to impose a particular view or model,” but rather to offer “an arena where a number of previously separate discourses can meet” (Ennals, 2016, p. 4).
The journal’s second decade begins as the first did; with questions, not answers. In this volume, these reflections are complemented by a special editorial by Professor Hans Christian Garmann Johnsen, Managing Editor of the journal. His view offers a perspective on the journal’s trajectory and future avenues.
This tenth volume of the European Journal of Workplace Innovation presents seven contributions. They address different domains of practice, reflect varied research strategies, and emerge from distinct institutional and national contexts. Parts of these contributions were first presented at the EUWIN conference The Future of Workplace Innovation, held in Donostia-San Sebastián (Spain) in October 2024
The European Journal of Workplace Innovation Celebrates 10 Years
No full textThe European Journal of Workplace Innovation is celebrating its 10th anniversary. The first issue was published in 2015 as part of the EUWI initiative (European Union Network for Workplace Innovation). The University of Agder took on the administrative role for the journal, which was established as an open-access scientific publication.
Over the past decade, the journal has published 17 issues including three special issues. These special issues focused on topics such as socio-technical systems thinking in manufacturing, sustainable work, and green jobs. The two most recent special issues were double issues. Notably, the issue on sustainable work was further developed into a book. All the issues are available online at this address: https://journal.uia.no/index.php/EJWI/issue/archiv
Adjusting to a Greener World: Radical changes or continuing adaptation for workers and firms in France?
No full textStarting from the hypothesis that the greening of production supposedly impacts three interconnected levels (employment systems, value chains and company strategies, occupations, skills, and work activities), the article provide insights resulting from mixed method research conducted by a Cereq team from 2020 to 2023. Firstly, analysis of statistical Cereq databases display two types of macrolevel results: the distribution of young people across green and greening jobs is shaped by segmentation between low skilled and high skilled jobs; the scope and way environmental norms impact workers’ activities depends on workplace organisations and management practices. Secondly, a three cases qualitative study in the construction; food retailing, solidarity economy sectors, underlines the importance of the relationship between companies and the market. This linkage remains a determining factor setting two greening trends at work: making profitable what is virtuous or making virtuous what is profitable, each organisation being able to be situated on a continuum from one to the other of these principles. Moreover, whereas environmental norms constrain workers to integrate new operating methods, the company surveys show how essential voluntary standards can be in orienting the trajectory of structures towards a more advanced and complex consideration of ecology in their activities, articulated with the health of the workers, their working conditions and the collective organisation of daily work.
Keywords: Greening, dynamics, workers, collective skills, health at work, deliberation, pathdependenc
Activities and Working Life in the Coming Great Transition
No full textThis chapter is about that coming process of transformation with focus on human activities and our working life. It is structured as follows: Section two contains some methodological remarks followed by a third section which summarizes “the state of the climate”. Section four provides a short analysis of the great acceleration, i.e. the rapid global growth process after WW2 and which basically has created the present climate crisis. In section five we analyze the conditions for the great transformation ahead. In section six we leave the general analysis in favor of the specific: we focus on the climate impact of the balance between activities within and outside the formal economy. Section seven is focused on productivity presently and in the post fossil society followed by a section (eight) on the role of coal. After a general discussion on the coming transformation of working life in the ninth section we focus on the role of AI in section ten followed by a competence-related approach in section eleven. Section twelve, which also concludes with the paper, discusses the necessary and probably most important issue in the path ahead towards a post fossil society: the transformation of our minds, i.e. the paradigm shifts in our understanding of the planetary conditions for human activity and work
Keywords:AI power consumption, artisan small-scale mining, carbon budget, climate and working hours, coal and work, the Great Acceleration, planetary boundaries, productivity decline, working condition
Learning from the New Deal for a Green Transformation: The importance of trade unions
No full textThe U.S. New Deal under President Roosevelt has become a broadly shared historical point of reference for a ‘Green New Deal’ of the 2020s. In fact, given the enormous, albeit very different, challenges faced by these two massive reform projects, it is worth taking a closer look not only or primarily at what was done in the 1930s, but above all at how it was put into practice. The present article highlights some of the policy lessons to be learnt by the New Deal of the 1930s for the political and societal process that is necessary to drive forward a “Green and Just Transition” today — in particular regarding the socio-ecological transformation of industry and the importance of trade unions in this process by the example of Germany.
Key words: New Deal, Green and Just Transition, socio-ecological transformation, trade union
Green Skills, Green Jobs, and the Green Eco-system. : Where do we go?
No full textThe global environmental, climate and biodiversity challenges require an urgent global response. The green transition and the move towards sustainability, including the transition to a climate-neutral economy, is triggering the need for a fundamental transformation of our society across a wide range of sectors. Europe must lead by example, by delivering on ambitious environmental, climate and biodiversity goals, enhancing growth, competitiveness, and quality job creation, while protecting the environment and ensuring a just transition to a more resource-efficient and circular economy.
SOURCE: EU COUNCIL CONCLUSIONS ON SKILLS AND COMPETENCES FOR THE GREEN TRANSITION. MARCH 7, 202
Vi trenger en ny kurs for fremmedspråk
No full textVi lever i krevende tider. Den heseblesende utviklingen i verdenspolitikken gjør at vi må lære å forstå verden på nytt, raskt. Her ligger det en viktig oppgave for fremmedspråkfaget, som er et skolefag med et dobbelt formål: elevene lærer et nytt språk og samtidig blir de kjent med andre land, andre folk og andre kulturer. Når verden endrer seg, må vi diskutere hva det betyr for faget. Vi må fornye fagets relevans, og vi foreslår derfor tre grep som samlet skal bidra til at elevene, og dermed samfunnet, blir mer verdensvant. Vi vil ta med alle elever på en verdensreise fra 5. trinn, vi vil gi aktualiteten mye større plass i timene og vi vil opprette et nasjonalt, digitalt språkakademi for å gi elevene mulighet til å lære helt andre fremmedspråk enn de som vanligvis tilbys i norsk skole
Cultivating teacher language awareness using picturebooks in the English language classroom
No full textLanguage awareness is a multidimensional concept centring on engagement with language. It involves three core dimensions: cognitive, affective and social. Teacher language awareness (TLA) encompasses these dimensions but additionally involves: the language user, the language analyst and the language teacher. In Norway, language awareness is seamlessly integrated into the national English subject curriculum. Moreover, the latest revision in 2020 explicitly demands the use of authentic English picturebooks with young learners. The purpose of this qualitative study was to investigate the ways in which English teachers can enhance their TLA by using picturebooks as a teaching resource in language work. This study employs the methodology of action research, including two action cycles. Four teachers, two at beginner level and two in upper primary, collaborated in pairs to carry out a teaching scheme focusing on vocabulary and collocations. The data were primarily collected from interviews, which were coded and analysed in line with qualitative content analysis. This study reveals three notable areas in which teachers experience enhancement of their TLA:Exploring the potential of picturebooks, Creating consciousness-raising tasks and Identifying opportunities for language talk. The teachers participating in the study state that using picturebooks as the main textual resource for language work has enriched their understanding of language awareness and motivated them to adopt a more holistic approach to teaching English
A Just Transition? : Green jobs, good jobs and labour market inclusivity in Scotland
No full textResponding to the climate emergency, governments have pledged to deliver a net zero future. Delivery requires more green jobs and a just transition of good jobs and labour market inclusivity. The problem is that there is no agreed methodology for classifying green jobs. The paper reports the findings from analysis of Scotland, applying the GreenSOC – an adaptation of the green occupation’s classification of the US Bureau of Labor Statistics and O*NET. The analysis uses the UK Labour Force Survey and webscraped job vacancy data to assess the extent and demand for green jobs as well as the pay and gender composition of these jobs. The findings are mixed. First, there are few new green jobs but a strong greening of existing jobs. Second, while green jobs offer higher wages, they tend to be dominated by male workers. These findings suggest that the employment benefits of the transition to net zero are less inclusive than anticipated and that policy and practice need to adjust. Offering recommendations, the paper provides improved definitional and empirical understanding of green jobs as well as offering insights into how green jobs might be made more inclusive.
Keywordsgender, good jobs, green jobs, green occupations, GreenSOC, just transition, labour marketinclusion, net zero, pay, Scotlan