Pioneers at start-up universities: how pragmatist agency explains education decisions amid uncertainties

Educational decision-making is often explained by pursuits of goals that either result from education (external goods) or are intrinsic to it (internal goods). These existing theories are usually derived from stable education contexts and offer limited insight into how families evaluate new school options with uncertain benefits. Drawing on pragmatism and sociological theories of agency, we develop ‘pragmatist agency’ to explain how families evaluate such options. Based on fieldwork and 62 in-depth interviews with middle-class families who chose start-up joint-venture universities (JVUs) in China, we show that families perceive JVUs as offering both internal and external goods. They synthesise these goods across temporal horizons to form composite visions of a ‘good life’ that inform their choices. We advance research on education decision-making by theorising pragmatist agency in changing contexts, where families treat internal and external goods both as ends in themselves and as means toward broader life goals.

Duke Scholars

Author Fangsheng Zhu DKU Faculty