ABSTRACT
Current developments in Western societies have been characterised by the buzzwords ‘information society’ and ‘knowledge society’. Freeman and Louça’s (2001) and Perez’s (2002) analyses and theories concerning the interplay between technological revolutions and societal development nevertheless give an articulated meaning to these words that helps to further understanding about ongoing transformation in professional and vocational education. According to these theories, a technological revolution takes place when a combination of radical innovations emerges that brings a new, cheap resource into the economy and leads to the creation of a new kind of infrastructure. Water wheels and canals, steam power, electricity and steel, the internal-combustion engine, oil and the chemical industry have been such epoch-making technological revolutions. Currently we are living in a long economic wave based on the information and communications technology revolution.
