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Tag Archives: meritocracy
So should we bother with ‘microclasses’?
Earlier in the year I published two blog posts on ‘microclasses’ – the idea that your specific occupation is an important structuring factor for the social world, beyond its position in a broader class. In this post I look back at … Continue reading
Social mobility and ethnicity in the UK
In a guest post, Neil Smith reviews the evidence – including his own – on the links between ethnicity and life chances in the UK, and why this matters for the drive to improve social mobility. In March 2012, we … Continue reading
A few things that inequality causes
Of the endless stream of papers that flash in front of my eyes every week, a large number are ‘Spirit Level style’ – that is, they look at the relationship of inequality and a ‘bad thing’ between countries/areas. If I … Continue reading
Posted in Blog posts
Tagged children, crime, effects of inequality, meritocracy, psychology, The Spirit Level, theorising inequality
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What the public thinks of ‘fair chances’
The other week I wrote about how ‘fair chances’ are not necessarily ‘equal chances’, spurred by writings of the philosopher Elizabeth Anderson. In one of those satisfying coincidences that happen from time-to-time, these ideas helped explain a conundrum that Karen … Continue reading
When a fair chance isn’t an equal chance
Even without knowing him personally, it should be obvious from the title of his book on school choice, ‘How Not To Be A Hypocrite’, that Adam Swift is an interesting guy. This is the sort of moral philosophy that tries … Continue reading
The rise and fall of a killer chart
No single graph has captured the political imagination quite like Leon Feinstein’s killer chart. In one go, it showed that talent was no substitute for parental advantage even at early ages – and has since been endlessly used to justify … Continue reading
Two cheers for the Social Mobility Strategy
You can see what they’re trying to do. In the midst of the most savage cuts to public spending in several generations, the UK Coalition Government wants to have a positive, socially conscious message alongside all the bad news. And … Continue reading
A theory of everything? Part two.
On 6th May, the British Sociological Association and the Open University are hosting a postgraduate conference on inequality; abstracts will be accepted up until the 28th February. The main theme of the conference is on whether we need on overarching … Continue reading
U.K.higher education: Is the social mobility argument really settled?
Last week Ben chipped in on U.K. higher education reform. I don’t know why he avoided it until now, but I might guess it was for much the same reason that I did. The same reason I was leery of … Continue reading
High-Stakes Admissions Testing—Alleviating or Reproducing Inequality?
Kendra Bischoff argues that high-stakes tests can play an important role in evaluating student performance, but they can also unintentionally promote educational inequality. The U.S. education system is currently in a state of flux as the Obama administration pushes reform, … Continue reading
