Who Pays the Piper Calls the Tune: Media Representations of Social Mobility and Educational Inequality in Turkey*

Turkey has traditionally been a highly unequal society, but in the 1980s and 1990s, as the existing safety nets were torn by demographic, economic, and social change, and without any solid welfare policy to repair the rupture, the distance between the top and the bottom of the inequality scale became wider than ever.[1] This meant that, by the late 1990s, compared to the late 1970s, there were twice as many poor children with a lower chance of escaping poverty.[2]

Income inequality drastically determined the educational experiences of Turkey’s children.  There was a strong correlation between income and school completion rates,[3] and the chances of staying in school. The chances of the bottom quintile to reach high education remained marginal, and fewer than one percent of that group made it past high school, whereas the chances of the top quintile in pursuing a university degree steadily increased.[4] Low income accentuated other inequalities as well, and poor children were more likely to suffer from gender and ethnic inequalities.[5] Furthermore, 30 percent of drop-out children cited low educational achievement as the main reason why they had quit school, and, that too, was closely related to economic inequality.[6] Cognitive development inputs, such as language stimulation between mothers and children, and the availability of learning materials were all linked to socio-economic circumstances.[7] I should also add that by the 1990s, those who could not pursue higher degrees constituted the most vulnerable proportion of the labour force, and thus, time spent in school became more important than ever.[8]

State transfers had been far from adequate in balancing the inequality children experienced. Several state expenditures concerning children were affected by the policy changes after the 1980s. For instance, consolidated budget expenditures on education halved.[9] Although it is true that achieving equality in education can be possible with the effective use of even the scarcest resources, regretfully, it was quite the opposite in Turkey where state transfers actually tended to go to high income households.[10] Meanwhile, education expenditure also differed greatly between income groups. The wealthiest 20 percent of households could afford to spend thirty times more money on education, compared to the poorest.[11] Furthermore, the last quarter of the 20th century saw Turkey’s upper classes generate a whole new set of standards. The percentage of private enrolment in secondary schools doubled,[12] and private teaching institutions, as well as private extracurricular music, language, arts, and sports courses expanded from the country’s elite to the top 20 percent.

As pointed out by Paul Gregg and Stephen Machin, intergenerational mobility (or immobility) of economic status is another important variable, and it should be analysed if “disadvantages faced during childhood display a persistent and negative association with the subsequent economic success of individuals.”[13]  Unfortunately, in this period, there was a two way relationship between education and income.  Physical and cognitive development, school attendance and completion all correlated with inter-generational opportunities.[14]

To sum it up, in a country where a great proportion of inequality was linked to education and employment, where the average income for a person with a higher degree diploma was six times more than an illiterate person, where the number of children per household, rate of infant and child mortality, and incidence of childhood diseases all correlated with parents’ educational attainment, education was clearly the primary determinant of children’s capabilities. Yet, the state did little to close the gap between those at the top and the bottom.  The richest of the population spent 30 times more than the poorest on education, and received 5.5 times more state transfers. Differences in income found their reflections in the quality of education, school environments, classrooms, study materials, not to mention students’ achievement and subjective well-being. This was how social injustice was visited upon the children.

My question here is, how did the news media reflect on inequality and immobility? The following observations that I am going to make are based on my doctoral research,[15] for which I have thoroughly scanned three popular national newspapers representing the centre, social democratic left, and conservative right, published between 1977 and 1997. I intensively read, listed and classified all news articles and comments about children, and gathered together more than 6000 pieces of text and images.

Turkey in the 1970s was not a lost paradise in terms of children’s life chances. The country had neither succeeded in guaranteeing an equality of capabilities for its children, nor had it promised a high level of social mobility. The journalists, of all people, who witnessed various examples of disparities, were very aware of this. Yet, the system aspired to a certain degree of meritocracy, a quality which the commentators were anxious to preserve. They were especially critical about the discrepancies in the quality of education. After all, education was the only feasible escape route out of inherited poverty and disadvantage.

The bitterness of criticism began to diminish in the following decade, even though inequalities did not. The news media’s perception of the disparities between children resorted to observing without comment by the 1980s. The raw resentment at the face of injustice was smoothened, and in some cases, it vanished altogether. Then again, many commentators were reluctant when it came to revealing the ugly truth to children themselves. Although they appeared to reconcile with inequality and came to terms with a society that favoured some children at the expense of others, many journalists argued that if at all possible, kids should be spared from recognizing their social statuses – be it by means of compulsory school uniforms or banning advertisements for luxurious products targeting children. However, these symbolic criticisms could not develop into a plea for social justice.

The timid request to conceal increasing disparities from children’s eyes was nonetheless more egalitarian than the downright defence of distinction that emerged in the 1990s. This sly reinterpretation changed the vocabulary of the equality/inequality debate by detaching it from the viewpoint of the disadvantaged children and approaching it from the perspective of the already advanced groups. From this angle, equality was no longer viewed as a principle but construed as an obstacle that would curb the advancement of already privileged children. This was done by distorting the concept of “equality of opportunities” and using it as a synonym of choice.

The subversion of the “equality of opportunities” concept was based on the assertion that it would be unfair to close down privatized escape routes in an unequal system. Obviously,  just because something was on the market does not mean that it is an equal and real opportunity, not unless all children could afford it. This twisting and turning of the concept emptied it of its meaning as it used evidence of the existing inequalities and egalitarian efforts to advocate distinction.  Thus, as the concept was reduced to an appendage of market emanated possibilities of choice in this distorted definition, it was separated from its social connotations.

The faulty uses of the “equality of opportunities” concept were especially apparent in the privatisation of education debate which used the term as a multi-functional tool. On the one hand, the terminology of egalitarianism was used by the opponents of special public high schools. These educational institutions that offered foreign language education to special students selected by nation-wide tests were considered to be causing inequality in regards that they offered better opportunities than regular public schools. But at the same time, private teaching institutions and private schools were defended as egalitarian instruments that helped close the gap between children. In other words, the evidence of inequality was used both to oppose egalitarian measures, and to advocate privatisation and offer escape routes for the already advantaged classes.

Meanwhile, the media helped maintain an illusion of meritocracy by concentrating on individual success stories. While the ladder of mobility narrowed, the accomplishments of accomplished lower and middle class children were presented as the ultimate testimony of meritocracy, and the high points they scored in school entrance exams became the centrepiece of news stories instead of the two-thirds of the child population who applied for the exams, but could not pursue higher education. Thus, stories about children with disadvantages who succeeded despite hardships were viewed as pillars of the individual’s victory against all odds. At the same time, however, these inspirational portraits which showcased their subjects as successful individuals who managed to overcome their disadvantages, by consequence, labelled children who could not as personal failures.

Meanwhile, the advertisement campaigns of the same decades told another side of the story. The blossoming free market had a remedy for every complaint. If parents wanted to be sure that their children were safe and sound playing outside in the park, they would buy an apartment in a gated community and watch them from the window. If they wanted to keep them safe on the road, they would buy a safer car. Even children’s health was a commodity. “Mothers who care[d]” would feed them the right way, fathers would buy better quality healthcare to make sure their kids got better in capable hands. They could even secure their children’s future by providing for a good education. The private school advertisements came in a wide collection that ranged from “raising individuals that respect national and moral values”[16] for the conservative families, to “democratic, secular, modern education”[17] for the secular; to a resort “away from the debate on education”[18]  for the undecided parents.

Esping-Andersen notes that “social inheritance” is still predominant in determining children’s life chances and that “parents’ social status continues unabated in dictating children’s educational attainment, income and occupational destination.”[19] However, as pointed out by Brian Barry, this is not inevitable, and social measures can ensure that children’s opportunities are not limited by their parents’ means. He concludes that “if there is any determinism involved, it is political: the range of powerful interests that would be mobilized in opposition to moves designed to disturb the process by which the advantages of one generation are transmitted to the next.”[20] That being the case, the news media’s penchant for holding parents liable for their children’s fates did not promote social intervention or greater social responsibility.

So my initial observations suggest that as the media moved away from criticising social immobility to apologizing for, concealing, normalizing, and then finally downright defending educational injustice and immobility, it burdened parents with a greater role in taking care of children, by presenting social mobility as a commodity that parents should get for their children.
*Paper presented at the Rags to Riches? Experiences of Social Mobility Research Group Annual Workshop, The University of Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities (TORCH), Exeter College, Oxford, June 2016.

                

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[1] Ayşen Candaş et al., Türkiye’de Eşitsizlikler: Kalıcı Eşitsizliklere Genel Bir Bakış (Established inequalities in Turkey: search for a comprehensive conceptual framework)  (Istanbul: Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Social Policy Forum, 2010). Extended Summary in English <http://www.spf.boun.edu.tr/index.php/en/established-inequalities-in-turkey-search-for-a-comprehensive-co>

[2] OECD, Growing Unequal? Income Distribution and Poverty in OECD Countries 2008, <http://www.oecd.org/els/soc/growingunequalincomedistributionandpovertyinoecdcountries.htm>

[3] Eldaw Suliman, Adam Wagstaff, and Agbessi Amouzou, Country Reports on Health, Nutrition, Population and Poverty: Turkey- Socio-Economic Differences in Health, Nutrition, and Population: 1993-1998 (Washington DC.: World Bank Group Health Nutrition and Population, 2007) <http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2007/04/7537513/turkey-socio-economic-differences-health-nutrition-population>

[4] Anıl Duman, “Education and Income Inequality in Turkey: Does Schooling Matter?” in Financial Theory and Practice 32 (3) (2008), pp. 369-385. <http://www.fintp.hr/en/archive/education-and-income-inequality-in-turkey-does-schooling-matter_263/>

[5] UNESCO, Reaching the Marginalised: Education for All  Global Monitoring Report 2010, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010) <http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0018/001866/186606e.pdf>

[6] Fatoş Gökşen, Zeynep Cemalcılar, Can Fuat Gürselel, Türkiye’de İlköğretim Okullarında Okulu Terk ve İzlenmesi ile Önlenmesine Yönelik Politikalar, (Basic education policies for monitoring and preventing drop-outs in Turkey’s  primary schools) (İstanbul: AÇEV, ERG, KADER, EU, 2006) <http://spm.ku.edu.tr/wp-content/uploads/pdf/okulterk.pdf>

[7] Nazlı Baydar, The Study of Early Childhood Development Ecologies in Turkey, (İstanbul: Koç University Education Reform Initiative, 2008).

[8] World Bank Poverty Reduction and Economic Management Unit Europe and Central Asia Region, Turkey: Economic Reforms, Living Standards and Social Welfare Study (Washington DC: World Bank, 2000), <http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2000/01/438177/turkey-economic-reforms-living-standards-social-welfare-study>.

[9] As noted by the World Bank, consolidated budget expenditures on education fell from 19.7 percent of total budget (4.02 of GNP) in 1992, to 10.1 (2.21 of GNP) in 1997. World Bank, Turkey: Economic Reforms.

[10] World Bank, Turkey: Economic Reforms.

[11] UNICEF, The Faces of Child Poverty in Turkey, (Ankara: UNICEF, 2006).

[12] UNESCO, Reaching the Marginalised: Education for All  Global Monitoring Report 2010, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010) <http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0018/001866/186606e.pdf>.

[13] Paul Gregg and Stephen Machin. “Childhood Experiences, Educational Attainment and Adult Labour Market Performance,” in Child Well-Being, Child Poverty and Child Policy in Modern Nations, edited by Koen Vleminckx and Timothy M. Smeeding (Bristol: The Policy Press, 2001).

[14] World Bank Europe and Central Asia Region, Human Development Department, Turkey: Expanding Opportunities for the Next Generation, A Report on Life Chances, <http://siteresources.worldbank.org/ TURKEYEXTN/Resources/361711-1270026284729/ExpandingOpportunitiesForTheNextGeneration-en.pdf>

[15] Deniz Arzuk Kocadere, Cut the Kids in Half: New Urban Childhoods in Turkey through the Lens of the Mainstream Media, 1977-1997, (Unpublished Ph.D. Thesis, Istanbul: Bogazici University, 2015).

[16] Hürriyet, 17 August 1997.

[17] Hürriyet, 18 August 1997.

[18] Hürriyet, 11 August 1997.

[19] Gøsta Esping-Andersen, “Inequality of Incomes and Opportunities” in The New Egalitarianism, edited by Anthony Giddens and Patrick Diamond (London: Polity, 2008).

[20] Brian Barry, Why Social Justice Matters (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2008).