Third ISA Forum of Sociology (July 10-14, 2016)

58

Social Inequality Despite or Due to Educational Expansion?

RC04 Sociology of Education (host committee)

Language: English

There is substantial empirical evidence that the educational background of parents plays an important role in the educational path of their offspring: pupils of families with higher educational background are more likely to enter university then pupils with medium (vocational) or lower educational family background. In consequence, they are themselves better educated and, therefore, have better chances to obtain jobs in higher positions. In many industrialized countries, politicians have tried to react to this reproduction of social inequality by encouraging young people to choose an academic over a vocational education. Whereas the increase in higher educated people may lead to higher productivity levels, it remains unclear whether the academic expansion is actually reducing social inequality.

This session welcomes papers that provide empirical evidence or theoretical explanation to social inequality despite or due to educational expansion. Under the assumption that higher positions in the society are limited and that there is an increasing oversupply of persons who are formally suited to perform high-qualified jobs, the question arises as to how selection processes for those higher positions are organized. Do persons with lower or medium educational family background really have with a given academic degree equal chances in achieving a higher position in the labor market? Or do other factors like social capital play a more important role? Or, further applying these questions at the macro-level: Are the increase in the number of academics and the educational expansion, a development that promotes overcoming social inequality or does it even foster it? Posters: