How to support the design of active lives that meet the challenges of the twenty-first century (economy, ecology and politics)?

Abstract

In recent decades support for the design of active lives has generally been conceived as an aid intended for qualified workers to manage their careers on the labor market. This conception is, for example, the basis of the official definition of this support published by the Council of the European Union in 2008. However, alternative definitions insist on all of the dimensions of any active life and wonder about the the view of the future to which such support refers. The very serious current crisis of the “anthropo-capitalocene” leads precisely to a focus on reflections on this future. Such a concern is at the heart of new interventions to support the design of active lives. It deals with the following question: by what forms of active life can we achieve the objectives of sustainable and equitable development defined by the major international organizations and the specialists in these matters? Developing this renewal of support for the design of active lives involves specifying the conceptual field on which to base it, experimenting with new interventions and setting up operating devices to propose them to the public.

Satisfaction with life in workers: A chained mediation model investigating the roles of resilience, career adaptability, self-efficacy, and years of education

“…The globalized world of the twenty-first century requires workers to be able to manage the challenges that globalization and technological progress entail (Maree and Di Fabio, 2018;Blustein et al, 2019;Guichard, 2022). Within this context, satisfaction with life has proven to be an important factor linked to job performance (Kołtuniuk et al, 2021), influencing quality, efficiency, and commitment to work (Lado et al, 2021).…”

Action and the active life: The contribution of contextual action theory to current career development challenges

“…In Guichard's (2022) view, the basic question is whether the final purpose of vocational guidance is “to ensure the optimal functioning of the market economy and social organization or to transform this economy and organization in view of increasing social justice and optimal human development” (p. 9).…”

“…Guichard (2022) relies on Hannah Arendt's (1958) notion of active life as the basis to begin to address the challenges of the current context. Arendt is identified as a political philosopher.…”

“…Guichard (2022) in his challenging and forward-looking paper in the Australian Journal of Career Development posed a critical question, that is, “How do we support the design of active lives that meet the challenges (economic, ecological, and political) of the twenty-first century?” (p. 5). Guichard answered this question by suggesting that the support of active lives in the current context requires a reconsideration of the conceptual frameworks that have been the bases of career guidance.…”

“…The purpose of this article is to describe how contextual action theory (CAT) (Young, 2019; Young et al, 2015a; Young & Valach, 2000, 2019) can serve to address the challenges that Guichard (2022) identified and contribute to the new conceptual field he envisioned. Briefly, CAT is an integrated framework for understanding human action as goal-directed, although not necessarily rational.…”