What is the relation between social class and social justice? This is currently a matter of public as well as academic interest. In this compelling new study the authors bring together recent developments in normative thinking about social justice with new empirical findings about educational attainment and social mobility. The result is a path-breaking contribution to the study of class and justice, one that will be of interest to sociologists and political theorists for years to come.

Against the Odds?: Social Class and Social Justice in Industrial Societies

Politics & Social Sciences

Marshall, Gordon

Swift, Adam

Roberts, Stephen

Social Sciences

Clarendon Press

How to Think about Religious Schools: Principles and Policies

Should religious schools be an option? Should they receive public funding? Are they bad for community cohesion? What should we make of the charge that they indoctrinate? How should they be regulated? People disagree on the answers to these questions. Some maintain that religious schools should not be permitted. If parents want to raise their children in a particular faith at home, then that is up to them, but schools should not be involved. Others think it obvious that parents should be free to send their children to religious schools. Any government that ruled that out would be violating parents' right to religious freedom, or their right to raise their children according to their own beliefs. In order to make progress on these issues, we need a way of thinking about them that enables us to understand more clearly what is at stake. This book provides a framework that identifies the different kinds of normative considerations that are in play and provides the basis for understanding why people disagree about religious schools. It uses a method that involves moving from the relevant normative considerations--especially the child's potential to acquire personal autonomy and to develop a capacity and disposition to treat others as equals--to specific policy proposals for governing religious schools in England today, taking into account the legal and political constraints on policy options and the likely unintended consequences of reforms. A unique feature of the book is that its three authors have somewhat different perspectives on the implications of the normative framework they each endorse, which they draw out in separate chapters. Despite reaching different conclusions on some philosophical issues concerning religious schools, the framework and method they share enables them to converge on a regulatory framework that forbids directive teaching aimed at imparting religious beliefs in publicy-funded religious schools, and that makes the charitable status of private religious schools conditional on avoiding this kind of teaching.

Mason, Andrew

Clayton, Matthew

Philosophy

Oxford University Press

We spend a lot of time arguing about how schools might be improved. But we rarely take a step back to ask what we as a society should be looking for from education—what exactly should those who make decisions be trying to achieve?   In Educational Goods, two philosophers and two social scientists address this very question. They begin by broadening the language for talking about educational policy: “educational goods” are the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that children develop for their own benefit and that of others; “childhood goods” are the valuable experiences and freedoms that make childhood a distinct phase of life. Balancing those, and understanding that not all of them can be measured through traditional methods, is a key first step. From there, they show how to think clearly about how those goods are distributed and propose a method for combining values and evidence to reach decisions. They conclude by showing the method in action, offering detailed accounts of how it might be applied in school finance, accountability, and choice. The result is a reimagining of our decision making about schools, one that will sharpen our thinking on familiar debates and push us toward better outcomes.  

Educational Goods: Values, Evidence, and Decision-Making

Brighouse, Harry

Ladd, Helen F.

Loeb, Susanna

University of Chicago Press

How not to be a hypocrite: the indispensable guide to school choice that morally perplexed parents have been waiting for.Many of us believe in social justice and equality of opportunity - but we also want the best for our kids. How can we square our political principles with our special concern for our own children? This marvellous book takes us through the moral minefield that is school choice today.Does a commitment to social justice mean you have to send your children to the local comprehensive - regardless of its academic results? Is it hypocritical to disapprove of private schools and yet send your child to one? Some parents feel guilty but shouldn't. Others should feel guilty but don't. Read How Not to be a Hypocrite, then answer the questionnaire, and work out where you stand on this crucial issue.

How Not to be a Hypocrite: School Choice for the Morally Perplexed Parent

Parenting & Relationships

Reference

Routledge

How not to be a hypocrite: the indispensable guide to school choice that morally perplexed parents have been waiting for. Many of us believe in social justice and equality of opportunity - but we also want the best for our kids. How can we square our political principles with our special concern for our own children? This marvellous book takes us through the moral minefield that is school choice today. Does a commitment to social justice mean you have to send your children to the local comprehensive - regardless of its academic results? Is it hypocritical to disapprove of private schools and yet send your child to one? Some parents feel guilty but shouldn't. Others should feel guilty but don't. Read How Not to be a Hypocrite, then answer the questionnaire, and work out where you stand on this crucial issue.

How Not to be a Hypocrite

Over the past decade, one of the most controversial and influential challenges to liberal political theory has been mounted by a number of writers usually labelled "communitarian". Focusing primarily upon the philosophical and metaphysical underpinnings of liberal accounts of justice, these critics have argued that such accounts presuppose an inadequate conception of the person and of the relationship between individuals and their communities, resulting in an impoverished view of the role of the state. This book traces the progress of the debate. Beginning with an account of John Rawls' "A Theory of Justice", it goes on to provide presentations of the work of the main communitarians - Michael Sandel, Alisdair MacIntyre, Charles Taylor and Michael Walzer. This is followed by an assessment of Rawls's more recent work, in which his "political" liberalism is shown to provide resources for a response to the communitarian critique. Finally the authors examine the writings of two other liberal theorists, Richard Rorty and Joseph Raz, each of whom can be read as pursuing strikingly different lines of argument which avoid the difficulties faced by Rawls but raise new problems of their own.

Liberals and Communitarians

Mulhall, Stephen

Blackwell Pub.

This book traces the progress of the liberal/communitarian debate. Beginning with an account of John Rawls's A Theory of Justice, it goes on to provide clear presentations of the work of the main communitarians - Michael Sandel, Alisdair MacIntyre, Charles Taylor and Michael Walzer. Clear and accessible in style, with a guiding agenda of themes and issues, this book is an indispensable aid to students of contemporary political theory.

Politics & Government

Wiley/Blackwell

The family is hotly contested ideological terrain. Some defend the traditional two-parent heterosexual family while others welcome its demise. Opinions vary about how much control parents should have over their children's upbringing. Family Values provides a major new theoretical account of the morality and politics of the family, telling us why the family is valuable, who has the right to parent, and what rights parents should-and should not-have over their children.Harry Brighouse and Adam Swift argue that parent-child relationships produce the "familial relationship goods" that people need to flourish. Children's healthy development depends on intimate relationships with authoritative adults, while the distinctive joys and challenges of parenting are part of a fulfilling life for adults. Yet the relationships that make these goods possible have little to do with biology, and do not require the extensive rights that parents currently enjoy. Challenging some of our most commonly held beliefs about the family, Brighouse and Swift explain why a child's interest in autonomy severely limits parents' right to shape their children's values, and why parents have no fundamental right to confer wealth or advantage on their children.Family Values reaffirms the vital importance of the family as a social institution while challenging its role in the reproduction of social inequality and carefully balancing the interests of parents and children.

Family Values: The Ethics of Parent-Child Relationships

Princeton University Press

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Swift, Adam. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Swift, Adam

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Swift, Adam. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Against the Odds?: Social Class and Social Justice in Industrial Societies

Against the Odds?: Social Class and Social Justice in Industrial Societies

How to Think about Religious Schools: Principles and Policies

How to Think about Religious Schools: Principles and Policies

Educational Goods: Values, Evidence, and Decision-Making

How Not to be a Hypocrite: School Choice for the Morally Perplexed Parent

How Not to be a Hypocrite

Liberals and Communitarians

Liberals and Communitarians

Family Values: The Ethics of Parent-Child Relationships