Minerva and the Market: The Sources of the Movement for School Choice

Abstract

This article examines why the idea of school choice was reborn in the 1980s after appearing and dying 15 years earlier. We argue that it is due both to renewed interest among conservatives and to unprecedented changes in sentiment toward public schooling among liberal policy scholars, urban educators, Black parents, and State governors. Though bringing success, this heterogeneous political base also makes the movement for school choice vulnerable to reverse. To analyze the sources of the movement, the article draws on the "state relative autonomy" theory of political power and the "garbage can" theory of organizational decision making.