E-Career Guidance in Quasi-Markets for Education: Roles and Controversies

Educational and career guidance consists of various forms of support to individuals considering their educational and professional future. During the last five years various types of quasi-markets have been introduced in Sweden at all levels of the educational system. This paper presents some recent Swedish experiences of how publicly financed Internet portals are constructed and used as a means to provide guidance (‘e-career guidance’). The main question in the following is: what are the roles and controversies associated with the emergent construction and use of e-career guidance in quasi-markets for education? Ecareer guidance is more than anything seen as a source of opening up access to information. The most controversial aspects concern whether information should be neutral or not, and how it should be used. It is concluded that the aims with processes such as these are twofold: constructing a tool for e-career guidance as well as an intermediary between citizens and the quasi-market for education.