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Compulsory Schooling as Preventative Defense

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Abstract

The question whether compulsory schooling is justifiable or not has been treated at considerable length by critics, defenders, and positions in-between. What these treatments—about paternalism and autonomy and institutionalization and more—have not directly analyzed is a question that precedes the issue of overall justification: the preliminary question of time. Does it matter when compulsion takes place? Furthermore, does the timing of compulsion matter to the question of overall justification? I will argue that it does matter, but for reasons not directly related to the question of overall justification.

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Acknowledgments

Thanks to all who read and listened to drafts and iterations of this paper—especially Gert Biesta, the anonymous reviewers of SIPE, Steven Webb, and Dan Farrell—and to George Atta, for his skillful assistance in preparing the manuscript.

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  1. Educational Foundations and Research, University of North Dakota, Education Building, Room 336 231 Centennial Drive Stop 7189, Grand Forks, ND, 58202-7189, USA

    Samuel D. Rocha

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  1. Samuel D. Rocha
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Correspondence to Samuel D. Rocha.

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Rocha, S.D. Compulsory Schooling as Preventative Defense. Stud Philos Educ 32, 613–621 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11217-012-9342-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11217-012-9342-3

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