A Certain Shift? How the Position of Adult Education within Lifelong Learning Weakens although Longitudinal Studies Show Its Benefits

This article explores howAdult Learning and Education (ALE) fits into the international Lifelong Learning (LLL) discussion. The shift in understanding LLL, now encompassing early childhood and school education since 2015, challenges ALE’s role. Strong evidence, mostly from longitudinal surveys, supports ALE’s importance, demonstrating positive labour market effects and wider learning benefits. The article aims to contribute to ALE advocacy by collecting evidence for practitioners and policymakers. This has been undertaken as part of the study on ALE within the concept of LLL (Grotlüschen / Belzer / Ertner / Yasukawa 2023).