No. 19 (10): Education is a right, not a privilege. July-December 2019

Poverty, inequality and exclusion are terms that reveal a serious problem in contemporary societies. Development, equality and inclusion are words that express, in counterpart, the intention and public objectives of reversing and solving these social problems. It is admitted that these structural phenomena are not reduced to the economic dimension and that it is necessary to incorporate into the studies, discussions, design of public policies and educational processes, other factors of cultural and educational, social and political, even identity, which are decisive to understand reality and be able to transform it. Undoubtedly, education is a disputed terrain in which different political and educational goals, institutions and programs, concepts and meanings, as well as modalities and practices converge; from always and given its nature, multiple expectations and collective projects are deposited in it, as well as demands and demands on the State. Inclusion appears in this discriminatory context as one of the challenges of education in democracies.

Discrimination, understood as inequality of treatment that has its sustenance on prejudices, stereotypes and cultural stigmas, crosses the educational field and increases the doubt about the capacity of institutions and the scope of public policies to contain it and face structural inequality. It is noted that education in its different levels and modalities is a social good distributed and applied unequally, even inaccessible to many social groups for reasons that not only obey the availability and adequate distribution of economic resources, but also cultural factors and politicians: identity classifications place people and groups in situations of disadvantage and educational exclusion.

Even though the principle of equality and the antidiscrimination law are inserted in the national democratic agenda and unfold a new legal and institutional scenario, both are invalidated by the reality resulting from an economic model that produces a structurally unjust society. Whenever a person or social group limits, annuls or prevents the effective exercise of a right, in a prominent way the right to education, because of some identity characteristic (ethnic origin, gender, age, disability or migratory status) , sexual preference, gender identity and expression, religious beliefs, among others) are facing discriminatory practices. On the other hand, it can be considered that studies about discrimination have a very recent origin and still do not constitute a stable paradigm in the social sciences.

Issue coordinator: Teresa González Luna Corvera