The World Conference on Education for All may be the centerpiece of the international concern about structural adjustment and may put back onto the agenda concerns about the provision of good quality basic education. Although international support will not be suddenly withdrawn from traditional vocational training schemes as a result of the conference and its follow-up, a much greater proportion of the available international aid could go to support basic education and life skills or coping skills. In many countries, the local response to the recent crisis has been a vocationalization, or an intensification of interest in forms of vocational education and training. Since the formal sector of employment cannot continue to grow at a rate to absorb young people leaving school, countries are altering educational systems to prepare individuals for the informal sector. In some countries, new strategies for small enterprise development have been born out of the creative potential of the crisis of restructuring and adjustment. Internal labor force agendas are converging with external ones. New-style technical and vocational education and training is predicated upon the public acknowledgement of the potential of the informal and small enterprise economy. (20 endnotes) (YLB)