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This article considers the role of diverse institutions in framing adult learning systems. The focus is on institutional characteristics and configurations in different countries and their potential impact on the extent of adult learning, as well as on inequalities in access to adult learning. Typologies of education and training systems as well as labour market and welfare systems are introduced in relation to specific particularities relevant to adult learning. An emphasis is placed on how institutions that are interwoven into several systems are relevant to adult learning. This is then considered and elaborated in the context of post‐Socialist countries in order to highlight important nuances that are relevant to adult learning and skill formation systems.

The construction of European education policy builds on a widely shared goal of transparency in qualifications, upheld by the popular narrative of mobile students endowed with scholarships from the EU Erasmus programme, which allow them to transfer credit points between universities and across national borders. EU education policy is increasingly inscribed in National Qualification Frameworks (NQF). Their European umbrella is coined the European Qualification Framework (EQF), which is linked to a discourse on or even shift to Learning Outcomes; functioning as a tool for the displacement of input to output categories in education systems with a view to make qualifications more transparent. This form of governance situates Learning Outcomes as a tool for policy reform that intentionally should affect all educational and administrative levels of European education. The article shows that the multitude of governance instruments used to promote a shift to Learning Outcomes are so varied that EU education policy has no apparent need of new instruments for this purpose. The fact that Learning Outcomes are linked to EU policy instruments of the Open Method of policy-Coordination and destined for several sectors of education, increases the likelihood that they will be translated into modified learning practices. Yet, there is a danger that governance of Learning Outcomes succumbs to a pitfall of declaratorily placing Learning Outcomes in the middle of learning practices in all subsectors of education, without sufficiently proving their real novelty and regulatory functions.

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Coherence of national education and training systems is increasingly tabled in European policy debates. Leaning on literature about the emergence and consolidation of national education systems, this article explores the rationale for VET reforms in Norway and Spain by scrutinising attempts to strengthen the coherence of their VET systems. Coherence has been sought through the unification of different strands of vocational education; initial, continuing and active labour market policies (what we call 'horizontal coherence') and the mainstreaming of VET curricular elements; plus the systematisation of VET practices across educational levels ('vertical coherence'). While both countries looked for coherence, their motivations, how they operationalised the term and the emphasis of their actions differed substantially. Spain has experienced a move from the three largely unrelated strands into a more unified system; Norway from a fragile VET system to the availability of more VET courses and apprenticeship arrangements at all educational levels.

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This article investigates what is claimed to be a shift towards national and European education systems based on Learning Outcomes (LO). We propose to delineate LO into three instruments (pedagogical, policy and organisational). When LO are related to a pedagogical debate, they can easily be positioned to constructivist learning theories in which the centredness of the learner is brought to the fore. This perspective is often emphasised by EU institutions and agencies when outlining implications for education and training practices. At the same time, LO are inscribed in a package of policies playing out at a national and cross-national level whose success lies in their political and organisational ramification. Of particular importance is how these policies change rules and procedures of educational institutions, notably curricula and the awarding of qualifications. Within this picture of learner centredness and institutionalisation, LO in the existing literature are analysed as pedagogical and policy instruments. This article proposes to add a third perspective, that of considering LO as an organisational instrument. This implies studying the work organisation of educational institutions, as well as the bodies and agencies (‘quangos’) of importance for bringing about LO. Another aspect which the notion organisational instrument can shed light on is the continuing efforts to improve the performance of education systems by means of quality control and auditing procedures. The article concludes that policy-making for education and training will benefit from studies able to accurately determine the nature of the instruments deployed in the ongoing discourse on LO. Against this background, some implications for future studies and analyses in the field of education and training are drawn.