The problem with 'raising aspiration' strategies: social mobility requires more than personal ambitions

The perceived lack of aspiration among young people from lower socio-economic backgrounds is used as a convenient explanation for the stagnating levels of social mobility. As a result, the 'raising of aspirations' has become the focus of government strategy over the past 20 years. Konstanze Spohrer explains why this has the effect of portraying educational success and opportunity as a matter of attitudinal change.