This book makes a forceful, tough-minded contribution to the raging debate over school choice. But it goes well beyond this debate, and refocuses the way we look at education. -- John F. Witte,University of Wisconsin-Madison

Advocates of school vouchers and other choice proposals couch their arguments in the fashionable language of economic theory. Choice initiatives at all levels of government have succeeded, it is claimed, because they shift responsibility for education reform from government to market forces. This timely book disputes the appropriateness of the market metaphor as a guide to education policy.