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What Would a Society Look Like Where Children’s Life Chances Were Really Fair?

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  • Gideon Calder

Abstract

An increasingly widely used term in recent decades, the central place of ‘life chances’ in UK policy has been confirmed by the retrospective renaming of the Life Chances Act 2010 (formerly the Child Poverty Act 2010). Alongside this, the notion that we should promote fairer life chances has gained purchase across the political spectrum. Yet this notion is loose and ill-defined. This article unpacks the term from the point of view of children. It highlights problems involved with defining and measuring fair life chances for children in suitably broad and non-partial ways, and argues for a plural measure. It outlines two separate dimensions where questions of fairness might apply, in terms of the life course, showing how a suitably supple conception of fair life chances would need to apply across both dimensions. And in light of this account, it suggests three policy approaches – to poverty, childcare, and the configuration of opportunities – which would help establish a society where life chances were really fair: not sufficient, but vital contributions. Overall, the article suggests that a commitment to making life chances fairer requires considerably more radical steps than the term’s recent handling in political discourse would imply.

Suggested Citation

  • Gideon Calder, 2018. "What Would a Society Look Like Where Children’s Life Chances Were Really Fair?," Local Economy, London South Bank University, vol. 33(6), pages 655-666, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:loceco:v:33:y:2018:i:6:p:655-666
    DOI: 10.1177/0269094218803553
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    3. Jo Blanden & Paul Gregg & Lindsey Macmillan, 2013. "Intergenerational persistence in income and social class: the effect of within-group inequality," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 176(2), pages 541-563, February.
    4. Richard Breen, 2010. "Social Mobility and Equality of Opportunity Geary Lecture Spring 2010," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 41(4), pages 413-428.
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