Too Much Information and Too Little Knowledge? An Attempt to Explain Findings From the Swedish Voucher System for Upper Secondary Education

Abstract

This article presents some unexpected findings from a study of the upper secondary school voucher system in Sweden. This publicly funded but relatively unregulated quasi-market offers a large number of alternatives to teenagers choosing an education. The choice situation is relatively complex and the stakes are high, but the youths themselves find the decision unproblematic. A possible explanation for this is that the future upper secondary students mistake information for knowledge. In lack of knowledge they follow a norm of conformity according to their outer circumstances. This leads youths from different socioeconomic groups to experience different choice situations and outcomes.

KEYWORDS:

• freedom of choice
• voucher
• quasi-market
• upper secondary school
• knowledge
• information
• Sweden

Notes

1. Berlin dismissed this idea as just a personal propensity for the eccentric in Mill and actually not freedom at all.