LAUSR

ABSTRACT While the primary focus of ethical discussions involving school voucher programs has been on the relationship—and possible disconnect—between educational outcomes and profit motivations, recently this focus has shifted to the relationship between consumer sovereignty and racial segregation. A growing critique of private voucher and charter programs claims that they are ethically problematic because they lead to racial and economic segregation of students, are linked historically to racial segregation, or both. As a result, both school choice advocates who support these programs for educational reasons and businesses that profit from them are said to be ethically blameworthy. We show that these claims are rooted in a misrepresentation of both the underlying historical events and empirical data. The article concludes by presenting an ethical case for educational competition on the grounds that, under certain circumstances, such programs tend to reduce race and economic class segregation.