'Thoroughly researched and written with such calm authority, yet makes you want to scream with righteous indignation' John O'Farrell
‘We can expect the manifesto-writers at the next general election to pass magpie-like over these chapters ... The appeal to act is heartfelt’Financial Times___________________Includes a new chapter, 'Moving Ahead?'
Britain’s private, fee-paying schools are institutions where children from affluent families have their privileges further entrenched through a high-quality, richly-resourced education. Engines of Privilege contends that, in a society that mouths the virtues of equality of opportunity, of fairness and of social cohesion, the educational apartheid separating private schools from our state schools deploys our national educational resources unfairly; blocks social mobility; reproduces privilege down the generations; and underpins a damaging democratic deficit in our society.
Francis Green and David Kynaston carefully examine options for change, while drawing on the valuable lessons of history. Clear, vigorous prose is combined with forensic analysis to powerful effect, illuminating the painful contrast between the importance of private schools in British society and the near-absence of serious, policy-shaping debate.
___________________'An excoriating accountof the inequalities perpetuated by Britain’s love affair with private schools' The Times
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
ISBN: 9781526601278
Number of pages: 336
Weight: 236 g
Dimensions: 198 x 129 mm
Thoroughly researched and written with such calm authority, yet makes you want to scream with righteous indignation - John O'Farrell
Their tone is calm and evidence-based, not agitprop … They have made up my mind. I now feel clear not just that change is urgently needed, but that options for change are more varied, imaginative and realistic than I’d dared imagine - Maggie Fergusson, Tablet
Fascinating - Alex Renton, Spectator
‘[A] powerful attack on private schools as engines of privilege … a forensic examination of what the authors call “Britain’s private school problem” … They start strong … leaving you in no doubt about the path from private schooling to the elite … This book does a fine job of explaining and damning Britain’s private school problem - Hugo Rifkind, The Times
An excoriating account of the inequalities perpetuated by Britain’s love affair with private schools - The Times
A passionate attack on private schools … Kynaston’s flair for anecdotes shines through ... Fascinating - Dominic Sandbrook, Sunday Times
Timely - Guardian
The historical background to our arguments over state and private education today is the most intriguing part of Engines of Privilege ... imbued with Kynaston’s fascination with the arguments and mores of post-war Britain - Anne McElvoy, Evening Standard
Francis Green and David Kynaston say loud and clear that Britain’s private schools are a social problem … This book provides warnings and lessons of what doesn’t work and ideas of what policies could work to dismantle these 'engines of privilege' - Socialist Worker
A fresh dissection of what [Kynaston and Green] deem "Britain's private school problem" ... We can expect the manifesto-writers at the next general election to pass magpie-like over these chapters - Financial Times
[A] forensic and damning examination of ... "Britain's private school problem" - The Week
David Kynaston is one of the great chroniclers of our modern story ... Every paragraph contains some glittering nugget - Praise for David Kynaston's 'Modernity Britain', Sunday Times
An exemplary narrative history, with the archives plundered judiciously and plenty of focus on people and their quirks … Fascinating - Praise for 'Till Time's Last Sand', The Times
This is the work of a scholar with a gift for illuminating every square inch of each enormous canvas he chooses to paint … Kynaston brings characters large and small to life - Praise for 'Till Time's Last Sand', Literary Review
A historian of peerless sensitivity and curiosity about the lives of individuals - Praise for 'Modernity Britain', Financial Times
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