Composed by three researchers, this roundtable aims to use a human capability lenses to provide a greater understanding of dimensions of vulnerability and the impact on students and teachers’ lives and experiences in education. The contributions are based on cases from Turkey, Portugal and Spain, and all three are theoretically informed by the capability approach (CA), developed by Sen and Nussbaum centred on human well-being, agency and individual freedoms. The added value of the roundtable is to illuminate, in different contexts, the benefits of combining the CA with other social theories in order to provide a greater understanding of the term vulnerability and the role of education.

In the CA, Sen defines capabilities as a set of real opportunities an individual has to choose from in order to achieve a life she has reason to value. Thus, a capability is an opportunity constructed both by external conversion factors, and internal drive dispositions. On the other hand, vulnerability could be considered as a lack of capability, that is, an increased susceptibility of people to be damaged or negatively affected by circumstances upon which they cannot exert effective agency.  Therefore, the cases address the question of what are the forces limiting individual capabilities and what is the relation of education within those. Hence, CA will be used as the theoretical umbrella to evaluate the narratives of our interviewees, together with current European educational policies and historical contexts in order to identify barriers to individuals negotiating power.

Turkey - This research aims to discuss the quality of three different generations of women teachers’ lives in Turkey from a capabilities-based social justice perspective. It shows how real functionings were available to women in different social contexts and provides an account of how these functionings were advanced in their educational careers. The study revises Nussbaum’s list (2000) to analyse women’s lives in terms of freedoms and vulnerabilities.

-          Portugal – This presents the analysis of first generation students’ (FGS) experiences in Portuguese higher education. FGS are an underrepresented population in European higher education, and particularly in the Portuguese context. The research is theoretically informed by Nancy Fraser’s concept of parity of participation, coupled with the CA.  It focuses on the constraints exerted by economic vulnerability in FGS agency, and shows through a multiple case study design how students’ choices (namely institutional choice, living arrangements and mobility) are shaped by limited resources and changing national policies that foster an uncertain future.

-          Spain – This considers the case of further education, specifically: the case of students enrolled in Intermediate Vocational Education and Training (VET) is discussed.  The paper acknowledges the instrumental aspect of VET and its value for increasing young people’s work opportunities, but also points out the deficit assumptions and social implications of this discourse. Using CA and Iris Young’s politics of difference, learners’ voices are placed at the forefront to evaluate the impact of VET in their ability to negotiate their intrinsic (i.e. health, family obligations) and external (i.e. social cuts, European adjustments) vulnerabilities.

Fraser, N. and Honneth, A. (1998)Redistribution or Recognition? A Political-Philosophical Exchange, London, Verso. Nussbaum, M. (2000) Women and Human Development. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sen, A. (1999) Development as Freedom. New York: Knopf. Young, I. M. (1990) Justice and Politics of Difference, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press