Should Students Have to Borrow? Autonomy, Wellbeing and Student Debt

Journal of Philosophy of Education 50 (3):351-370 (2016)
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Abstract

The orthodox view on higher education financing is that students should bear some of the costs of attending and, where necessary, meet that cost through debt financing. New economic realties, including protracted economic slowdown and increasing austerity of the state with respect to the public funding of goods and services has meant that the same generation who have to borrow the most in order to attend face significantly fewer employment prospects upon graduation. In this context, is the current approach of shifting the costs of post-secondary education from the general public to individual students justified? Most debate on the issue has focused on the demands of distributive justice within the modern higher education system and on the whole accepts the idea that students ought to pay. I argue that distributive arguments alone are insufficient because they tacitly endorse the provision of higher education as being much like a consumer's choice. As an alternative, I explore the place and importance of higher education in supporting personal autonomy as a central liberal democratic value. I then argue that debt financing of higher education places unreasonable constraints on student's choices with respect to the kind of democratic citizens that they would otherwise aspire to be. This constraint has negative implications for the wellbeing of individual students and the larger society.

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Christopher Martin
Florida Atlantic University

Citations of this work

Educational justice.Julian Culp - 2020 - Philosophy Compass 15 (12):e12713.
Student partnership, trust and authority in universities.Morgan White - 2018 - Educational Philosophy and Theory 50 (2):163-173.

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References found in this work

Justice, health, and healthcare.Norman Daniels - 2001 - American Journal of Bioethics 1 (2):2 – 16.
Is health care (still) special?Shlomi Segall - 2007 - Journal of Political Philosophy 15 (3):342–361.
Education and the Good Life.John White - 1991 - British Journal of Educational Studies 39 (3):366-367.
Who Should Go to University? Justice in University Admissions.Ben Kotzee & Christopher Martin - 2013 - Journal of Philosophy of Education 47 (4):623-641.
Debt, Freedom, and Inequality.Alex Gourevitch - 2012 - Philosophical Topics 40 (1):135-151.

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