Page 36 - Igor Ž. Žagar in Ana Mlekuž, ur. Raziskovanje v vzgoji in izobraževanju: mednarodni vidiki vzgoje in izobraževanja. Ljubljana: Pedagoški inštitut, 2020. Digitalna knjižnica, Dissertationes 38
P. 36
r aziskovanje v vzgoji in izobr aževanju: mednarodni vidki vzgoje in izobr aževanja
tiles, only 4.5 % of students come from households with incomes in the bot-
tom quintile and there are the same number of students from the top 1 %
of income earners as from the bottom 60 %. Of course, the issue is compli-
cated here by transnational comparisons. Certainly, Kolinda’s salary when
an Assistant Secretary General of NATO was extremely high internation-
ally. As a number of the articles point out, the stipend Katarina will receive
from Harvard is twice her mother’s monthly salary as President of Croatia,
some net 25,000 HRK or 3,400 Euro. We should not worry too much about
financial hardship in this case, however; recently, N1 reported that togeth-
er with her husband Jakov, the President had savings amounting to 1.8 mil-
lion kuna (240,000 Euro) and two properties with a total worth of 3.8 mil-
lion kuna (0.5m. Euro) (N1 Info, 2019).
It is worth speculating on what Pierre Bourdieu would have made
of the discussion, not least because his work makes a direct connection
between diverse kinds of ‘capital’ and educational success. In Bourdieu’s
terms, it would be nonsense to ask if Katarina got her place on merit or
through veze; or whether the material wealth of her parents made a differ-
ence or not. Bourdieu would elaborate on his concept of ‘cultural capital’,
the intangible assets or dispositions, accumulated, or not, over time, in a
relation of exchange with material wealth and correlated with attendance
and success at the ‘best’ schools and universities (Bourdieu and Passeron,
1977). Cultural capital is the force that amplifies material inequalities, con-
verting them, via academic success, into the reproduction of social stratifi-
cation. Although there are no direct guarantees, Katarina’s cultural capital
was certainly high, with each and every aspect reinforcing and strengthen-
ing the others over time. What was perhaps most surprising was that, apart
from comments about how bad Croatian universities were, there was little
or no discussion of education and social mobility in Croatia itself.
Education and social stratification in socialist Yugoslavia
There have also been very few studies of education and social stratification
in socialist Yugoslavia. Here, Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović is, also, not a great
authority, in view of some of her repeated statements on the challenges of
growing up near Rijeka between 1968 and 1986, going to Rijeka’s gymna-
sium having rejected the place in a trade school offered by Šuvar’s reforms
and, in fourth grade of secondary school, becoming an exchange student in
Los Alamos in the United States. Her recollections of the totalitarian sys-
tem she lived under, “Behind the Iron Curtain” as she would have us be-
36
tiles, only 4.5 % of students come from households with incomes in the bot-
tom quintile and there are the same number of students from the top 1 %
of income earners as from the bottom 60 %. Of course, the issue is compli-
cated here by transnational comparisons. Certainly, Kolinda’s salary when
an Assistant Secretary General of NATO was extremely high internation-
ally. As a number of the articles point out, the stipend Katarina will receive
from Harvard is twice her mother’s monthly salary as President of Croatia,
some net 25,000 HRK or 3,400 Euro. We should not worry too much about
financial hardship in this case, however; recently, N1 reported that togeth-
er with her husband Jakov, the President had savings amounting to 1.8 mil-
lion kuna (240,000 Euro) and two properties with a total worth of 3.8 mil-
lion kuna (0.5m. Euro) (N1 Info, 2019).
It is worth speculating on what Pierre Bourdieu would have made
of the discussion, not least because his work makes a direct connection
between diverse kinds of ‘capital’ and educational success. In Bourdieu’s
terms, it would be nonsense to ask if Katarina got her place on merit or
through veze; or whether the material wealth of her parents made a differ-
ence or not. Bourdieu would elaborate on his concept of ‘cultural capital’,
the intangible assets or dispositions, accumulated, or not, over time, in a
relation of exchange with material wealth and correlated with attendance
and success at the ‘best’ schools and universities (Bourdieu and Passeron,
1977). Cultural capital is the force that amplifies material inequalities, con-
verting them, via academic success, into the reproduction of social stratifi-
cation. Although there are no direct guarantees, Katarina’s cultural capital
was certainly high, with each and every aspect reinforcing and strengthen-
ing the others over time. What was perhaps most surprising was that, apart
from comments about how bad Croatian universities were, there was little
or no discussion of education and social mobility in Croatia itself.
Education and social stratification in socialist Yugoslavia
There have also been very few studies of education and social stratification
in socialist Yugoslavia. Here, Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović is, also, not a great
authority, in view of some of her repeated statements on the challenges of
growing up near Rijeka between 1968 and 1986, going to Rijeka’s gymna-
sium having rejected the place in a trade school offered by Šuvar’s reforms
and, in fourth grade of secondary school, becoming an exchange student in
Los Alamos in the United States. Her recollections of the totalitarian sys-
tem she lived under, “Behind the Iron Curtain” as she would have us be-
36
