Lessons To Be Learned? Åsa Plesner On Sweden's Free - Market School Experiment

Long hailed as a paragon of social democracy, Sweden is one of the only countries in the world - perhaps the only - where limited companies can profit from running schools. In a free-market project based on schools vouchers that proved a step too far even for Augusto Pinochet's Chile, pupils are treated as customers and choice is paramount. But while all that sounds good to parents and indeed shareholders, who are banking millions in profits, the law of unintended consequences has had a hugely negative impact on a school system that was once among the world's best. Not only are the Social Democrats not doing anything to change the system, they are actually not allowed to talk about it at all thanks to the agreement that is keeping their weak government in power. Today's lesson is from Åsa Plesner and is a cautionary tale for what can happen when vital structures in society are opened up to the free market.