Issue XI: pp. 28-31: Capability and Educational Equality

VOX - The Student Journal of Politics, Economics and Philosophy [Accessed 31 December 2009].

King, M. L. (2009 ed.) The Purpose of Education. The Maroon Tiger, 1947. Available at www.drmartinlutherkingjr.com/thepurposeofeducation.htm. [Accessed 01 January 2010].

Sharpe, L; and Gopiathan, S. (2002). After Effectiveness: New Directions in the Singapore Education System? The Journal of Education Policy, 17(2), 151-166.

Freire, P. (1970a). The Adult Literacy Process as Cultural Action for Freedom. The Harvard Educational Review, 40(2), 205-225.

Freire, P. (1970b). Cultural Action and Conscientization. The Harvard Educational Review,

40(3), 452-477.

Montessori, M. (1914)(1965 ed.). Rambusch, N. M., ed. Dr Montessori’s Own Handbook.

New York: Schocken.

The Online Citizen (n.d.). MM Lee’s interview with NatGeo – transcript. Available at theonlinecitizen.com/2009/12/mm-lees-interviewwith-natgeo-transcript/. [Accessed on 30 December 2009].

_____________________________ Clement Wee is a first year undergraduate student reading PPE at the University of York

Capability and Educational Equality a Just

Provision for Students with Disabilities and Special Educational Needs i

By Dr Lorella Terzi

T

HE IDEAL OF EDUCATIONAL EQUALITY IS FUNDAMENTALLY

grounded in the egalitarian principle that social and institutional arrangements should be designed to give equal consideration to all. Educational institutions should therefore enact the value of equal concern by ensuring that all students have a fair share of educational goods and fair access to the benefits that these yield. However, beyond this broad stipulation, the precise content of the ideal of educational equality is more difficult to determine.

Equality in education is mainly theorised along the ‘divide’ between equal input, however defined, and equal out28

come (Brighouse, 2003, p. 472), and there seems to be a lack of consensus on its implications at policy level.

In this article, I aim to contribute to the debate on educational equality by dealing with the timely and contentious question of a fair provision for students with disabilities and special educational needs. I argue for an understanding of educational equality in terms of a principled framework for a just distribution of resources. This framework employs a version of liberal egalitarianism and draws primarily on the capability approach, as developed by Amartya Sen (1992, 1998) and Martha Nussbaum

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(2000, 2006), as well as other scholars.

According to the capability approach, social and institutional arrangements should enact the value of equal concern by aiming at equalising people’s ‘capability to function’, i.e. their real opportunities for well-being and hence for living good lives. It is through the concepts of capabilities (real opportunities for functionings, or real freedoms) and functionings (valued beings and doings, such as, for example, being educated, or having a rewarding job) that a conception of educational equality can be outlined and defended, in order to provide justified answers to the initial question.

Education, Capability and Equal Participation in Society The capability approach helps substantially in conceptualising educational equality by focusing on the fundamental functionings, promoted by education, that are essential prerequisites for an equal participation in society.

Education, both in terms of formal schooling and informal learning, is central to the capability approach. The approach emphasises specifically the contribution that the capability to be educated makes to the formation and expansion of other capabilities and, hence, the contribution it makes to people’s opportunities for well-being and for their effective freedoms (Sen 1992, Nussbaum 2000). Consider, for instance, the case of learning mathematics. Formally learning mathematics

not only expands the individual’s various functionings related to reasoning and problem solving, but also widens the individual’s sets of opportunities and capabilities with respect, on the one hand, to more complex capabilities such as reflection, understanding and the formulation of one’s valued aims, and, on the other, to better prospects for opportunities in life. Learning mathematics may lead to choosing to become an economist or a teacher, for instance, as well as promoting one’s civic participation in different forms.

Thus, education has a distinct role in expanding capabilities and in determining people’s real opportunities for well-being. This leads to a second important consideration. Given the complex interrelation of individuals with the society they inhabit, forms of civic and indeed economic participation play an important role in determining one’s well-being, while providing the basic structure for the exercise of effective freedom. Hence, an education consistent with enabling people to achieve well-being, and allowing the exercise of agency, should entail the promotion of functionings and capabilities that enable them to become participants in dominant social frameworks while promoting reflection on valued goals.

Among the countless capabilities that might be developed through education and schooling, the approach therefore suggests the promotion and expansion of those necessary to participate as equals in society (see Anderson, 1999).

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VOX - The Student Journal of Politics, Economics and Philosophy

This responds, on the one hand, to the duty of institutional arrangements to show equal consideration to all, while, on the other hand, providing the constitutive elements for making one’s life go well, thus for the enactment of freedom.

Capability Equality in Education: Elements of a Fundamental Entitlement Drawing on the considerations presented so far, I can now outline a first, provisional understanding of what constitutes capability equality in education. This consists in equal opportunities and access to levels of educational functionings necessary to participate effectively in society. Basic functionings promoted by education form the necessary enabling conditions that, once achieved, allow individuals to take part effectively in their dominant framework. In so far as we can, ultimately we should provide individuals with equal, secure access to these educational functionings, which constitute the transformational resources necessary to participate effectively in society. While conceptualising equality in terms of the equal opportunities for functionings, this view highlights the importance of the prospective educational achievements in terms of levels of functionings for an effective participation in society. It implies a threshold level of achieved functionings that educational institutions should promote and foster, set at the level necessary for effective participation in dominant 30

social frameworks (see Nussbaum, 2000). This constitutes a fundamental educational entitlement and establishes a threshold level of basic capabilities that should be guaranteed to all individuals.

Capability Equality in Education: the Case of Disability and Special Educational Needs How is a just provision for students with disabilities and special educational needs established within the educational entitlement outlined? Students with disabilities and special educational needs are entitled to the achievement of educational functionings established as a matter of justice for all individuals.

However, disability and special educational needs imply limitations on functionings and capabilities that may result in difficulties in the achievements of those levels of educational functionings. It follows, therefore, that these students should receive educational opportunities and resources necessary to achieve effective levels of functionings in their dominant social framework and that the additional provision, where necessary, is a matter of justice.

Equalising opportunities and securing fundamental educational functionings in the case of children with disabilities and special educational needs means exactly providing those additional opportunities and resources necessary for the achievement of an effective participation in society. ii Thus, for instance, a student with dyslexia is entitled to additional opportunities and resources

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that will allow her to achieve reading and writing functionings appropriate to participate effectively in her social framework. The aim here is not simply the fairness of the share of resources, but, more appropriately, it is ensuring appropriate levels of functioning as a matter of justice. iii Elements of a Principled Framework for Educational Equality Although an effective participation and the possibility of taking part as equals in society do not require individuals to achieve high levels of educational functionings, their promotion is important both intrinsically and instrumentally. How should resources be distributed for the achievement of higher levels of functionings? Here John Rawls’s second principle of justice proves helpful. The principle maintains that social and economic inequalities are to be attached to offices and positions opened to all under fair equality of opportunity, and that these inequalities have to benefit the least advantaged members of society (Rawls, 2001: 42-3). It seems plausible to argue that, beyond the threshold level of fundamental capabilities guaranteed to everyone, those who can obtain the highest functionings in education should receive resources to that aim, providing that the benefits they gain from their education correspond to an equal long term prospective improvement and benefits for those least successful. In this sense, for instance,

higher levels of functionings achieved by some, may provide the rest of us with more advantages than we would have otherwise had and, therefore, improve our long term well-being in considerable ways. Similarly, severely disabled children or children with profound and multiple impairments might benefit from the higher educational functionings achieved by others, and this ultimately justifies applying considerations of efficiency, as entailed by Rawls’s second principle, to the distribution of resources for higher educational functionings.

To sum up, a principled framework for educational equality consists of two parts. The first stipulates that equal opportunities for fundamental educational functionings should be provided at levels necessary to individuals for an effective participation in society. It sets a threshold level of capabilities and states that all should have effective equal opportunities to the achievement of those fundamental educational functionings. From the conception of disabilities and special educational needs as functionings and capabilities limitations, it follows that necessary and legitimate additional resources have to be devoted to children designated as having disabilities and special educational needs. The second part of the framework applies considerations of efficiency to the distribution of opportunities and resources for the effective access and achievement of higher levels of functionings.

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