Education as a Human Right: Principles for a Universal Entitlement to Learning

Education is widely recognized as a fundamental human right, yet the nature of the right remains unclear. Is it an entitlement to go to school, to acquire particular forms of knowledge or develop particular skills or attributes? And why exactly is education so important that we might defend all people's right to it? This book provides a much-needed exploration of this key contemporary issue. Highlighting limitations in the approaches of both the Education for All initiative and existing international law, the book presents a radical new vision of how the right can be understood. As well as basic education, there are discussions of higher and lifelong education, of human rights education, and of the intersection of rights-based approaches with others such Amartya Sen's 'capabilities'. The work serves as a stirring defense of the universal right to education against instrumental conceptions of learning, the inactivity of national governments and the abrogation of responsibility of the international community.

Tristan McCowan is Senior Lecturer in Education and International Development at the Institute of Education, University of London, UK.

Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
1. Introduction: The Global Education Landscape
2. The Right to Education in International Law
3. Justifications for the Right to Education
4. A Right to What? Inputs, Outcomes and Processes
5. Upholding Human Rights within Education
6. Is there a Universal Right to Higher Education?
7. Contributions of the Capabilities Approach
8. Learning Human Rights
9. Principles and Implications
References
Index