This article gives an overview of the development of gender equality and women's participation in adult learning and education in the history of the International Conferences on Adult Education (CONFINTEA). Though the equality of rights was highlighted throughout the various conferences, the first Global Report on Adult Learning and Education (GRALE) observed that a gender gap in the participation in adult learning and education still persisted in 2009. This is especially remarkable with regard to the impact of CONFINTEA V in 1997, because it focused on the issue of women's participation and gender equality. A review of the CONFINTEA VI programme elements and the national reports prepared by UNESCO Member States in 2008 reveals that gender issues have to some extent moved from the centre of attention to the periphery. This article therefore tries to explore how gender principles are acknowledged in CONFINTEA VI and its follow-up.
International research on adult education systems reaches certain limitations when explaining differences between and within countries. Often, research within the multilevel system of adult education examines issues located at the macro-level, meaning policy and legal frameworks, and at the micro-level, dealing with impacts on learners. This article focuses on the meso-level of adult education in two sample countries, referring to providers and their educational offers of publicly financed basic and community education. Guided by the theoretical approaches of educational governance and neo-institutionalism, we identify governance regimes and organizational fields and analyze the impacts of legal and financial regulation on providers and their provision. Based on document review and expert interviews, relations at the national and regional levels are analyzed. We find a decentralized system supporting the regional provision of basic adult education in Spain and a mixture of national and regional regulations leading to regional provision based on learners’ needs in England.
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