Social Justice Education: a Qualitative Research from Capability Approach Perspective

Education is both a basic social right and inherent to the “right” personal development. Here, the case of migrant students attending Italian schools serves as an example of how education is a critical right. The migrant students discussed here do not have the same starting point as Italian students; the issue of language is central to their unequal start-ing points. This calls into question the issue of social justice in terms of one’s capabili-ties. Amartya Sen’s theory of a person’s capability the “freedom to achieve” is an issue of social justice (“Capability Approach”) that maximizes the meaning of the social right to education. The article discusses the results of a qualitative project that used Grounded Theory to illustrate how the process of welcoming and giving access to migrant students in Italian schools is an example of Capability Approach and Social Justice Education.