Vocational Training in France and Britain: Mechanical and Electrical Craftsmen

Abstract

The rise of microcomputer technology in the last decade has introduced changes in the way tasks are carried out at both the technical and the organisational level in manufacturing industry, with consequential changes in the need for skills and training for both mechanical and electrical craftsmen. Both in Britain and in France the relevance of traditional and narrow concepts of skill (the craftsman highly skilled in one set of operations) is being questioned, and in both countries changes are taking place in the way young people are prepared for mechanical and electrical work.