ABSTRACT
Wilson (1999) has pointed out that although we have the idea that it is wrong if people are excluded from a community, we also need to recognise that a community exists for a particular purpose and has its own aims and values. There may then be a clash between two perspectives, including everybody within a group ‘seems inconsistent with fulfilling a particular group’s purpose . . . if I am unable to play a musical instrument at all, it seems to make little or no sense to say that I can be included in an orchestra . . .’ (ibid.:110). He suggests that when we see schools as learning not just social communities some selectivity and exclusion is likely to be necessary. Barrow (2001:236) makes a similar point when he suggests that a policy of inclusion may ‘offend the principles of fairness’. He argues that a policy of inclusion has no ‘self-evident moral virtue’ and often involves ‘a refusal to discriminate on seemingly relevant criteria’ (ibid.:240).
