In this video, Krzystof Czarnecki (Poznan University), provided an explanation for cross-country differences in educational inequalities based on variations in higher education systems being embedded in institutional configurations of modern welfare states and linked to partisan politics. Using the novel Student Support and Fees Dataset provided within the Social Policy Indicators (SPIN) (Nelson et al. 2020), he revealed diversity in student funding across 32 affluent countries that can be traced back to the long-term cumulative power of four political-party families: Christian democratic and left-wing parties aim at making studying unconditional on student household’s labour market participation. But while Christian Democrats foster decommodification via family support measures, left-wing parties seek to ensure students’ independent transition to adulthood via direct payments. Commodification, e.g. via tuition fees, mostly results from a conservative rule, while both Conservatives’ and Liberals’ student funding schemes tend to be means-tested and targeted to students from low-income households.
