We explore social justice advocacy and education from the vantage point of elite theory as articulated in the works of Gaetano Mosca and Vilfredo Pareto. Elite theory is applied here to re-appraise the explicit and implicit educational means and ends inspired by contemporary social justice along three inter-related dimensions: the place of…

Children from low-income families face many social and economic disadvantages, and high-quality preschool can help to alleviate some of them. Is "preschool for all" the best way to extend preschool subsidies to unserved disadvantaged children? Fully funding such a policy would be costly, and it is likely that a significant minority of…

It is widely accepted that investing in early childhood helps build the foundations of a healthy, productive, and equitable society. Guided by that knowledge, a range of broad-based programs and targeted services make a significant difference for millions of children, yet a closer look at outcome data shows that some benefit greatly, some benefit…

There has been strong advocacy for educators to extensively examine pedagogical assumptions to design more inclusive and accessible classes. However, our assumptions about inclusivity and the interplay of privilege and students' "common sense" have received little attention. As such, a common sense gap exists, where faculty may regard…

This paper offers a qualitative analysis of decisions of 64 community-college students in seeking a transfer in Hong Kong. In weighing a number of educational options and then offers, with a similar level of desirability in some cases, in order to achieve their transfers, advantaged-class and disadvantaged-class respondents struggled with…

The observed increase in economic inequality, where the major concern is relative to the huge growth of the highest incomes, motivates to revisit classical measures of inequality and to offer new ways to synthesize the variability of the entire income distribution. The idea is to provide policy makers a way to contrast the economic position of the…

Geographers have long advocated for decolonizing geographic research and curriculum to produce forms of anti-oppressive knowledge and learning. While these calls have become more prominent in recent years, these conversations are rarely translated into a reflection on pedagogy and how we integrate anti-oppressive teaching in the classroom. This…

Contemporary politics has brought the figure of the 'uneducated' into glaring view, from Trump's 'love' of the 'poorly educated' to analyses suggesting a supposed 'uneducated populous' is responsible for the rise of far-right politics. In this paper I respond to this so-called 'post-truth' contemporary moment by considering how education underpins…

The dual aims of this essay are to consider some ways in which school music reproduces neoliberal rationalities and to suggest possibilities whereby playful aspects of music education can open spaces for disruption and resistance. After defining key terms (capital, neoliberalism, rationality, social reproduction, and alienation), patterns of…

In this article, we argue that those in social work education should refocus how they conceptualize and teach intersectionality to produce more effective social work practitioners. We emphasize that social work should shift from educating students to evaluate diverse clients as the accumulation of individual identities operating in isolation…

The changes associated with the Renaissance, Reformation and Enlightenment moved the seat of authority from princes and bishops to the individual and made the application of rationality the measure of believability. This paper argues that the current period of socio-political and moral upheaval, triggered by disruptive technology, anger about…

This paper investigates the production of space and language policy in Ras Al Khaimah, a city in the United Arab Emirates. The paper builds on recent work in socio- and applied linguistics that has made use of sociospatial concepts from human geography. It argues that researchers should not only investigate space as a factor structuring language…

Some authors argue that access to elite universities can bring about a 'habitus transformation' for working-class students, however in this paper, based on a three-year life history study, it is suggested that the transformative effects of the elite university experience come about in relation to and constrained by the working-class habitus.…

Privilege is one of the central constructs social work educators reference to increase self-awareness and concern about inequality, but it is often oversimplified. This article argues how the concept of privilege can be made more credible to learners by anchoring it to everyday business-as-usual decision making, stereotyping, and various…

What does it mean to achieve socioeconomic and racial justice in the United States, and what role can the postsecondary education system play in achieving these aims? Unfortunately, justice is often an elusive concept as it relates to educational achievement. In this paper, the author argues that, to understand the meaning of racial and…