Durable inequality: an historical sociology of ambivalent neoliberalisation in French education

Quentin Maire

Chapter 3 in Neoliberalism, Inequality and Education, 2026, pp 37-60 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: The neoliberalisation of French education since the 1980s has been ambiguous. On one hand, levels of public investment have been maintained, and education has remained largely shielded from reorganisation into a market for private profit. On the other hand, some neoliberal reforms have been evident, especially in higher education. This record explains why (relative) social inequality has persisted in French education, showing little sign of amelioration despite the introduction of policies specifically aimed at correcting it. I argue that the historical relationship between neoliberalism and educational inequality has been contradiction-ridden. The cumulative effect of successive policy reforms, neoliberal or otherwise, has done little to alter the intergenerational reproduction of class inequality. In continuity with the pre-1980s period, French education still operates as a conservative system of sponsored mobility. France thus illustrates a specific modality of the relationship between neoliberalism and education, one combining persistent inequality with weak neoliberalisation.

Keywords: Neoliberalism; Inequality; Social Class; State Transformation; Education Policy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781035363711
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