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Article Information
Article first published online: January 27, 2021; Issue published: September 1, 2021
Received: January 16, 2020; Accepted: November 25, 2020
Author
Søren Christensen
Aarhus University
Thomas Grønbek
Aarhus University
Frederik Bækdahl
IT University of Copenhagen
Abstract
Purpose: The article focuses on the emergence of a private tutoring industry in Denmark over the last decade. Specifically, it explores how private tutoring companies legitimize themselves in a social and cultural context where education has for long predominantly been understood in egalitarian terms.
Design/Approach/Methods: The article takes inspiration from Viviana Zelizer’s work on morally controversial markets. It explores the “moral labor” performed by private tutoring companies to redefine the exchange of private tutoring services as a socially wholesome activity. It does so through a close analysis of business information, company websites, and news media articles on private tutoring.
Findings: The article argues that, generally, the marketing material of tutoring companies focuses more on social equality and student well-being than on academic success. Thus, the companies predominantly legitimize themselves in terms of long-standing Scandinavian ideals of education. Increasingly, these are also the terms in which the companies criticize mainstream schooling.
Originality/Value: The article contributes new knowledge of private tutoring in a Scandinavian context where very little research on the issue has so far been conducted. Theoretically, it relates previous research on “legitimation projects” of private tutoring companies to broader sociological theories on market making.
Keywords
Denmark, market making, moral labor, private tutoring