School choice offers solution to ideological book selection battles?
The phrase “book banning” is becoming a greater concern for parents and educators (prompting some districts like the FMSD to make official—perhaps heavyhanded—resolutions against such prohibitions). Both the Left and Right have led bans on literature/curriculum of all kinds, with no signs of stopping. Reason's Ilya Somin suggests that school choice policies would allow parents to select an institution that aligns with their values, and this could reduce censorship efforts.
Over the last several years, much of the US has been beset by culture wars over education in which right and left try to skew public school curricula in their favor, while banning materials they find offensive or distasteful. On the right, the state of Utah recently passed a ban on "indecent" books that is so sweeping that some school districts have banned the use of the Bible in elementary schools because it contains "vulgarity and violence." Florida recently enacted a sweeping ban on education about sexual identity, that goes far beyond its earlier "don't say gay" law, and applies all the way through high school. It should be obvious that books describing sexuality and violence often have educational value, especially in higher grades. And there is nothing wrong with telling students about different types of sexual identity, even if it is also desirable that this be done with due sensitivity....
There is no perfect solution to this problem. But it can be mitigated by school choice policies under which parents are given vouchers or tax credits to choose from a wide range of schools. Many states have enacted new school choice laws over the last few years. While much of this is driven by conservatives and libertarians, parents and students with a wide range of views stand to benefit.
Liberal parents in conservative areas can choose schools that reflect their preferences, and the same goes for conservatives in liberal areas, and the many parents who would simply prefer to avoid culture war-oriented curricula of either side. To the extent that red states are more likely to enact school choice policies than blue ones, liberal parents and students in red jurisdictions are actually among the biggest beneficiaries of school choice. Otherwise, they might be forced to accept curricula dictated by the likes of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and his socially conservative allies.
To be sure, parents exercising choice may select schools with dubious curricular policies, whether of the right or the left. But that danger is less severe when parents can "vote with their feet" through school choice than when they make decisions about education (and other issues) in elections. Because of the very low odds that any one vote will make a difference, ballot box voters have little incentive to seek out information about policy issues, or to evaluate what they learn in a unbiased way. They are instead rationally ignorant, and often act as biased "political fans." That dynamic helps explain the incredible idiocy of many culture-war driven education policies. They aren't adopted through careful reasoning, but for the purpose of appealing to the raw emotions of political fans.
This article originally appeared in Reason. Read the whole thing here.
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