Quality Issues and Insights in the 21st Century

7-20

Authors: Adele Bianco

This study explores the job quality as a pivotal issue in the 21st century, and, at the same time, assigns it a key role in fostering social development and sustainability. The main approach of this paper is a qualitative one, although the author mainly refers to data from international organizations. The author is currently working on these issues, both in terms of the development theory and in terms of empirical studies. This study focuses on two issues, namely working conditions and the greening of work, both of which are going to impact the evolution of the job quality in the 21st century. The first issue relates to working conditions, as there is a compelling need to improve the quality of employment both in advanced and developing countries. The second issue focuses on the transition towards the green economy, the only possibility to relaunch development and to guarantee the environmental survival. This transition requires, at the same time, the production and the employment sectors to undergo a reconversion process. This study is structured as follows. The first paragraph investigates the current working conditions and outlines some measures needed to improve the job quality; the second paragraph analyzes the job quality from the perspective of the greening economy. In the first paragraph our analysis highlights that the measures needed to improve the working conditions lie in tackling unemployment in advanced and emerging countries and in promoting decent work for all. Although progress has been made in some cases, in many countries working conditions are still characterized by high levels of informality, working poverty and vulnerable employment. Making progress in these fields means upgrading the economic and social capabilities of workers and improving social protection institutions. While investigating the difficulty of assigning a clear definition to the term “Green Job” (GB), this paragraph also shifts the research focus to those economic fields that fall into the area of interest of the Green Economy. The Green Economy can offer new development opportunities to advanced as well as emerging countries. Planning employment policies is a key strategy that facilitates development and investments within the Green Economy; indeed, the workforce employed in this sector needs to acquire specific job competencies that will further boost its growth. The results of this paper shed light on the fact that while being a shared issue by both developed and developing countries, the job quality proves to be a driver for development. In addition, the policies in the field of job quality encompass measures such as social inclusion, support to women, education and equal opportunities, and therefore it is imperative that both the governments of developing and developed countries work consistently towards the implementation of such measures. The conclusions of this paper show that the job quality in the 21st century sees a convergence between the Northern and Southern countries of the world. Both areas share the need to improve the qualitative and quantitative levels of employment, to eradicate poverty (which is endemic in the Southern part of the world and is still growing in emerging and advanced countries like China), to promote social inclusion among the weakest subjects of the job market and to make their industrial productions more environmentally sustainable (greening economy) by means of a suitable professional and technological conversion. Job quality is our common future.

31-40

Authors: Daniela Grignoli

The society needs to rediscover education as a means for social inclusion. One of the most difficult challenges, at this respect, is to define the social inclusion of marginalized groups (the unemployed, the elderly, the low educated). Very seldom these people take an active part in society: having access to education can be a way to avoid marginalization. This study will analyse the results of the European research project EDucation Against Marginalization (EDAM). Eight partners from as many European member States developed a database on life-long learning, which offers a perspective on whether and on how educational programs, aimed at improving the social inclusion of marginalized groups, can be optimized. In particular, the focus of this article is on the EDAM survey carried out in Molise, which involved 132 respondents out of a total of 995 at project level. The instruments of the survey were two questionnaires, addressed to social vulnerable people involved in educational programmes, and aimed at detecting to what extent attending such programmes is beneficial to their social inclusion. The questionnaires were explained and delivered in two different stages, 15 classes away from one another, by the respective teachers, specifically trained for the purpose. With respect to the social inclusion process, the analysis of the results in Molise showed an increase of 52.3% for participation and of 37.4 % for connection. Moreover, the results have pointed out that after participating in adult education programmes, the participants have experienced an increased capability of “history making” of society. In any case, although the results show to be fairly robust and the models fit is always adequate, using all the data as a single sample requires that we interpret the data with caution.

50-56

Authors: Stanislava Stoyanova

There are some different standards for quality of processing and transmitting of information. This study compared three quality standards of transmission of verbal written information. One quality standard is keeping initial meaning with giving necessary and sufficient information, according to Peterson, 1996. Another quality standard is meeting some expectations and norms in the society, according to Gasser, Cortesi, Malik and Lee, 2012. The third quality standard is signalling what is important, according to Sanford and Sturt, 2002. 123 Bulgarian youth participants produced 984 sentences trying to rephrase 8 verbal illusions per participant. These verbal illusions were presented as verbal written information in the form of several independent sentences non-related meaningfully in a paragraph. The participants processed and transmitted information from these sentences significantly more incorrectly (4/5th from them) than correctly – 1/5th from them. Processing and transmitting correctly information was not related with its perception as supported by the most people in society. The results indicated that signalling what is important, as well as meeting some expectations and norms in the society were presented in the answers of the respondents, but these standards did not contribute significantly to the correct processing and transmitting verbal written illusions in youth age. However, they prevailed over the quality standard of giving necessary and sufficient information.