Careers and Freedom

"Professor Peter J Robertson is one of the leading figures in the UK’s career development scene and internationally renowned. He wrote this volume whilst leading the Career Development Institute as its President and then taking over as Chair for the National Institute of Careers Education and Guidance. Such roles demonstrate both his pre-eminence in the field and his commitment to building dialogue between policy, practice, theory and research. A task that he continues to great effect in the current volume.

Careers and Freedom builds on Pete’s longstanding interest in the work of the economist and theorist Amartya Sen, drawing on Sen’s work on capability theory and applying it to careers. The book is however much more than a translation of Sen’s work into the field of career studies. Rather is offers us an original and exciting perspective on careers and career guidance, which should be integrated into the theoretical canon of the field.

In the book, Pete guides us through thinking about the nature of freedom (and importantly what he calls unfreedom) and how this relates to career. Careering has long been considered as a battleground between advocates of human agency and possibility and theorists who emphasise structures, oppression and constraints. At its most basic the question is whether we can be whatever we want to be, or whether such opportunities are only open to the privileged few. Such discussions are existential for the field of career development, and Pete manages to offer new light on old debates through his use of capability theory.

The book draws together a range of new and existing theories to frame the concept of career development in a highly original way. Existing theories of career have tended to draw substantially on psychology and sociology, but this book broadens this disciplinary basis bringing in philosophical perspectives that have been largely absent in previous work. Pete’s great skill as a writer means that these elevated discussions are carefully grounded in the reality of people’s career enactments and in the practice of career guidance.

I hope that you enjoy the book as much as I did. I hope that it inspires you to career, act, write and guide others in pursuit of freedom."

Tristram Hooley, Professor of Career Education at the University of Derby and Visiting Professor at the Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences and Canterbury Christ Church University