Nursing education and social constraints: an indepth analysis

This paper summarizes the results of a study analyzing the social, economic and political factors affecting the nursing education system in the Federal Republic of Germany (F.R.G.). Using a hermeneutic-dialectical approach the researcher examined the circumstances surrounding the conceptualization, implementation and non-continuation of an experimental program for the university education of nurse instructors in the F.R.G.--the first university program in nursing in the country. Paulo Freire's model of oppressed group behavior was found to be useful in making sense of the data and was drawn on to outline the characteristics of a nursing education that is 'freeing', that is, which which leads to the development of critical consciousness in nurses.