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      The Risks of Social Reproduction: the middle class and education markets

      research-article
      London Review of Education
      IOE Press
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            Abstract

            We live, as some theorists put it, in a 'risk society'. Risks are diverse and new forms are constantly arising. There is an 'over-production' of risk. We face the brittle uncertainties of individual self-management, as Beck sees it, alone and 'fragmented across (life) phases, space and time' (1997, p. 26). This is a bleak and elemental social world. This paper takes a rather different view of risk, as having both collective and divisive dynamics and effects. It offers not so much an alternative view as one that is re-socialised. Focusing on middle class families and the 'risks' of school choice some key features of the 'prudentialist' risk management regime extant in the UK are examined. That is, those 'definite social exertions' that middle class families must make on their own part or face the very real prospect of generational decline are considered. Risks are perceived to arise from the engagements between the family and the education marketplace, and are embedded in the paradox wherein society becomes structurally more meritocratic but processually less so, as the middle class work harder to maintain their advantages in the new conditions of choice and competition in education. The paper is peppered with extracts from interviews with middle-class parents. These serve for illustration and discussion.

            Content

            Author and article information

            Journal
            10430
            London Review of Education
            IOE Press
            1474-8460
            01 November 2003
            : 1
            : 3
            : 163-175
            Article
            1474-8460(20031101)1:3L.163;1- s1.phd /ioep/clre/2003/00000001/00000003/art00001
            10.1080/1474846032000146730
            c6a2619f-40cd-4417-9505-fec01cf2ef09
            Copyright @ 2003
            History
            Categories
            Articles

            Education,Assessment, Evaluation & Research methods,Educational research & Statistics,General education

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