D. Brent Edwards Jr.
At the University of Hawaii, I am Chair of the Department of Educational Foundations, Professor of Theory and Methodology in the Study of Education, and Track Coordinator for the master’s program in Global Perspectives on Education Policy and Practice. I am also an affiliate researcher with two initiatives at the Autonomous University of Barcelona—namely, the master’s program on Education Policies for Global Development (GLOBED) and the research unit on Global and Comparative Studies in Education (GLANCE).
For my research, I draw on frameworks and concepts from global political economy, international relations, critical policy studies, systems thinking, organizational theory, policy sociology, and post-/decolonial literature in order to explain and analyze global trends in education, with an emphasis on policies related to privatization (e.g., vouchers, charter schools, low-fee private schools) and decentralization (e.g., administrative decentralization, community-based management, participatory development, school clusters, school block grants). More specifically, my work is dedicated to answering questions about the changing nature of education governance in the context of globalization, with a focus on low-income countries. A central concern of my investigations is to understand the role of international and intermediary organizations (such as bi- and multi-lateral organizations, think tanks, civil society organizations, and philanthropic organizations) in the governance of education, as well as the effects of these organizations and the policies they promote in practice, particularly in marginalized contexts.
Geographically, my research has primarily focused on Latin America (Colombia, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Paraguay) and Southeast Asia (Cambodia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore), though I have also conducted research in Africa (Kenya, Namibia, Zambia).
I have written or edited 12 books and more than 150 articles and book chapters. In addition to serving on numerous editorial and advisory boards, I publish regularly in top journals in the fields of education policy, comparative and international education, and international development, including: Review of Educational Research; Comparative Education Review; Comparative Education; Development in Practice; International Journal of Educational Development; Journal of Education Policy; Educational Policy; Education Policy Analysis Archives; and Globalisation, Societies and Education, among many others. By consistently addressing issues that are of central importance to these fields, I ensure that my work remains relevant to contemporary debates around theory, method and practice. Beyond academic publications, I also regularly publish blogs and newspaper articles so that my findings reach a wider audience. My work has been published in English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Japanese.
Previously, I was awarded Fulbright Funding for my work in El Salvador, in addition to holding visiting, affiliate, or research positions at George Washington University (USA), Univeristy of Califoria-Berkeley (USA), the Autonomous University of Barcelona (Spain), the University of Amsterdam (Netherlands), University of Central America (El Salvador), the University of the North (Colombia), The University of Tokyo (Japan), Waseda University (Japan), and the University of Auckland (New Zealand). Apart from being a consultant for the World Bank, I have produced evaluations, reports, and working papers for a range of international organizations, foundations, and research centers, such as USAID, UNESCO, Education International, the Global Campaign for Education, Open Society Foundations, the Spencer Foundation, and the National Center for the Study of Privatization (Columbia University).
For more: http://www.dbedwardsjr.com/
For my research, I draw on frameworks and concepts from global political economy, international relations, critical policy studies, systems thinking, organizational theory, policy sociology, and post-/decolonial literature in order to explain and analyze global trends in education, with an emphasis on policies related to privatization (e.g., vouchers, charter schools, low-fee private schools) and decentralization (e.g., administrative decentralization, community-based management, participatory development, school clusters, school block grants). More specifically, my work is dedicated to answering questions about the changing nature of education governance in the context of globalization, with a focus on low-income countries. A central concern of my investigations is to understand the role of international and intermediary organizations (such as bi- and multi-lateral organizations, think tanks, civil society organizations, and philanthropic organizations) in the governance of education, as well as the effects of these organizations and the policies they promote in practice, particularly in marginalized contexts.
Geographically, my research has primarily focused on Latin America (Colombia, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Paraguay) and Southeast Asia (Cambodia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore), though I have also conducted research in Africa (Kenya, Namibia, Zambia).
I have written or edited 12 books and more than 150 articles and book chapters. In addition to serving on numerous editorial and advisory boards, I publish regularly in top journals in the fields of education policy, comparative and international education, and international development, including: Review of Educational Research; Comparative Education Review; Comparative Education; Development in Practice; International Journal of Educational Development; Journal of Education Policy; Educational Policy; Education Policy Analysis Archives; and Globalisation, Societies and Education, among many others. By consistently addressing issues that are of central importance to these fields, I ensure that my work remains relevant to contemporary debates around theory, method and practice. Beyond academic publications, I also regularly publish blogs and newspaper articles so that my findings reach a wider audience. My work has been published in English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Japanese.
Previously, I was awarded Fulbright Funding for my work in El Salvador, in addition to holding visiting, affiliate, or research positions at George Washington University (USA), Univeristy of Califoria-Berkeley (USA), the Autonomous University of Barcelona (Spain), the University of Amsterdam (Netherlands), University of Central America (El Salvador), the University of the North (Colombia), The University of Tokyo (Japan), Waseda University (Japan), and the University of Auckland (New Zealand). Apart from being a consultant for the World Bank, I have produced evaluations, reports, and working papers for a range of international organizations, foundations, and research centers, such as USAID, UNESCO, Education International, the Global Campaign for Education, Open Society Foundations, the Spencer Foundation, and the National Center for the Study of Privatization (Columbia University).
For more: http://www.dbedwardsjr.com/
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Special Journal Issues by D. Brent Edwards Jr.
Thematic sections of this issue: Measurement and metrics, governance and state capacity, means of implementation for the 20230 agenda, shocks and resilient education systems, and theoretical and historical considerations.
The introductory essay for the special issue goes beyond a brief description of each of the cases. This article (a) presents a framework for understanding the connections among globalization, privatization, and marginalization in relation to education; (b) distills, visually presents, and expands upon the dialectical connections evident “in” and “through” the cases that make up the special issue; and (c) emphasizes a number of lessons for the globalization-privatization-marginalization nexus.
The papers in this special issue are grouped into two clusters. This grouping reflects the fact that, while all the papers speak to the three core concepts of globalization, privatization, and marginalization, the papers typically place analytic emphasis on two of the three and then consider the implications of their findings for the third. The papers in the first cluster focus on the ways privatization is being advanced through the dynamics of globalization, and then consider the implications for—or the connections to—marginalization. For example, these papers examine how policymaking processes, the provision of refugee education, quasi-market reform politics, international large-scale assessments of student learning, and the work of international non-governmental organizations are all advanced by political and economic globalization in ways that not only open spaces for privatization but also exacerbate marginalization in various forms.
The papers in the second cluster, in contrast, take as their point of departure various forms of privatization, considering directly their consequences for marginalization. These essays are framed with, and then connect back to, the dynamics of globalization. The different forms of privatization discussed by these papers include charter schools, vouchers, neo-vouchers (i.e., tax credits), and private schools that serve low-income families. Although their analytic focus is not squarely trained on the causes of each kind of privatization, the articles do address the contextual factors and the forces of political-economic globalization that have led to, or have contributed to, the form of privatization under study.
In all, the articles report on research from the “Global North”, meaning the United States, Western European and Mediterranean countries (i.e. Portugal, Italy, Israel), and New Zealand, with other studies focusing on the “Global South”, meaning countries in Latin America (i.e., Argentina, Chile, Peru), Africa (Zambia), and Asia (with two papers focused on India). One paper focuses on refugee education generally and thus is not focused on a specific geographic context.
Importantly, the articles contained in this special issue include but go beyond a focus on low-income countries. High-income—“developed”—countries are not immune to the effects of globalization and privatization. It is crucial that we understand the ways that these phenomena manifest across different contexts, not least because, across contexts that may seem wildly different, globalization and privatization have similar effects and are the result of similar forces, though the details of how they play out may be distinct.
This project was developed over the course of the past two years or so. We thank the authors for their excellent contributions and the reviewers for their helpful feedback.
We hope this special issue makes a contribution. Please feel free to forward along to colleagues, students, etc.
Best,
Brent Edwards
Alex Means
University of Hawaii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Globalization, Privatization, Marginalization: Mapping and Assessing Connections and Consequences in/through Education
Authors: D. Brent Edwards Jr. and Alexander Means
Section 1: Privatization and Marginalization in/through Globalization
2. “Glocalisation” doctrine in the Israel public education system: A contextual analysis of a policy-making process
Authors: Dvir, Maxwell, & Yemini
3. Education governance and privatization in Portugal: Media attention on the public debate about public and private education
Authors: Fatima Antunes, Sofia Viseu
4. Private encroachment through crisis-making: The privatization of education for refugees
Author: Hang Minh Le
5. Marginalization in education systems: The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) and the failure discourse around the Italian education system
Authors: Goncalves de Freitas, Jacob, & Nozaki
6. “A Problem They Don’t Even Know Exists”: Inequality, Poverty, and Invisible Discourses in Teach First New Zealand
Authors: Oldham & Crawford-Garrett
Section 2: Globalization and Marginalization in/through Privatization
7. Education privatization in the United States: Increasing saturation and segregation
Author: Adamson & Galloway
8. Education markets and schools’ mechanisms of exclusion: The case of Chile
Author: Adrián Zancajo
9. Speaking cooperation, acting competition: Supply-side subsidies and private schools in socioeconomically disadvantaged contexts in Buenos Aires
Authors: Mauro Moschetti, Carolina Snaider
10. Educating on a budget: The subsistence model of low-fee private schooling in Peru
Authors: María Balarin, Clara Fontdevila, Paola Marius, & María Fernanda Rodríguez
11. Low-fee private schools, the State, and globalization: A market analysis within the political sociology of education and development
Authors: Edwards, Okitsu & Mwanza
12. Motivations to set up and manage low-fee private schools in India
Authors: Hannah Mond & Poorvaja Prakash
13. Children’s accounts of labelling and stigmatization in private schools in Delhi, India and the Right to Education Act
Authors: Michael LaFleur, Prachi Srivastava
Issue title: Sociological Contributions to School Choice Policy and Politics Around the Globe
Guest Editors: Amanda Potterton, D. Brent Edwards Jr., Ee-Seul Yoon, and Jeanne Powers
Introduction
1. Sociological Contributions to School Choice Policy and Politics Around the Globe: Introduction to the 2020 PEA Yearbook
Authors: Amanda U. Potterton, D. Brent Edwards Jr., Ee-Seul Yoon, and Jeanne M. Powers
Section I: The Strategies and Responses of Schools and
2. Families to School Choice Policies School Counselors’ Assessment of the Legitimacy of High School Choice Policy
Authors: Carolyn Sattin-Bajaj and Jennifer L. Jennings
3. Schools in the Marketplace: Analysis of School Supply Responses in the Chilean Education Market
Author: Adrián Zancajo
4. Opting for Private Education: Public Subsidy Programs and School Choice in Disadvantaged Contexts
Authors: Mauro Carlos Moschetti and Antoni Verger
5. The Development and Dynamics of Public–Private Partnerships in the Philippines’ Education: A Counterintuitive Case of School Choice, Competition, and Privatization
Authors: Andreu Termes, D. Brent Edwards Jr., and Antoni Verger
Section II: Sociology of School Choice Politics and Education Markets
6. Media Strategies in Policy Advocacy: Tracing the Justifications for Indiana’s School Choice Reforms
Authors: Joel R. Malin, Christopher Lubienski, and Queenstar Mensa-Bonsu
Ideas and the Politics of School Choice Policy: Portfolio Management in Philadelphia
Authors: Rand Quinn and Laura Ogburn
7. Parental Accountability, School Choice, and the Invisible Hand of the Market
Author: Amanda U. Potterton
8. School Choice Research and Politics with Pierre Bourdieu: New Possibilities
Author: Ee-Seul Yoon
Section III: Conflict and Competition for Resources in Organizational and Regulatory Contexts
9. Teacher Power and the Politics of Union Organizing in the Charter Sector
Authors: Huriya Jabbar, Jesse Chanin, Jamie Haynes, and Sara Slaughter
10. Rearranging the Chairs on the Deck or True Reform? Private Sector Bureaucracies 239 in the Age of Choice—An Analysis of Autonomy and Control
Authors: Sarah Butler Jessen and Catherine DiMartino
Commentary
11. Toward a Global Political Sociology of School Choice Policies
Author: Bob Lingard
Books by D. Brent Edwards Jr.
To address this gap, this book places front and center questions of theory, ontology, epistemology and method related to policy movement. It explores a wide diversity of approaches to help understand the policy movement phenomena, providing a useful guide on global studies in education, as well as insights into the future of this dynamic area of work.
mobilization and global education policy by presenting a novel approach to
studying policy movement. The central purpose of this approach – labelled
bibliographic ethnography – is to highlight the work that bibliographic
references do in the context of academic and organizational texts, while
also keeping one eye on the larger implications of the productive nature of
such citations beyond the limits of the text itself. The approach brings an
ethnographic sensitivity to the analysis of the role that citations play in the
sense that it asks: what kinds of statements or claims are enabled in the context
of academic and organizational texts by the invocation of a given reference?
As will be explained, this analysis is then placed within a second level of
reflection where the researcher assesses the work of citations in relation to
the dominant features of the sociohistorical and political- economic context.
The method we suggest breaks with the internalist reading of texts – in our
case, scientific research and organizational publications on global education
policy – thus enabling us to critically analyze the structures and practices
that grant authority to particular kinds of research in the first place. Analysis
of this kind necessarily has a political dimension, because the underlying
phenomenon itself is political. That is, the issue of who to cite and how
to interpret and instrumentalize existing research has political implications,
even when authors do not have open political intentions with their research.
The central argument is, first, that the programs and projects of international organizations are introduced into and are constrained by multiple layers of rituals, performative acts, and cultural logics, logics that intersect with and reinforce the political, economic, and social structures in and through which they operate. These dynamics are summarized by the term ritual governance, which is defined as the symbolic and standardized behavior in which actors engage as they participate in the “traditions and institutions by which authority in a country is exercised” (Kaufmann et al., 1999, p. 1). As will be seen, the contextual factors that guide governance practices are largely beyond the reach of the international development organizations; the relevant logics have their roots in state ideology but also extend back to the colonial logics that continue to operate at the heart of the state apparatus.
The second central argument is that international aid organizations and the governments with which they work are engaged in a “ritual aid dance” (Bull, 2005) where each actor plays a part but does not (and cannot) acknowledge the ways that it depends on—or at least uses—the other for its own gain. The ritual aid dance is understood as a form of ritual governance, but one that is specific to the relationship between a given government or governments, on one hand, and any organization offering “aid” in the context of international development work, on the other—though it should be noted that the ritual aid dance can also be analyzed in terms of how international organizations engage with each other in order to preserve the legitimacy of the international development enterprise. This process can be considered a dance because each participant responds to and needs the other, and because both sides do so in ways that are carefully choreographed, with the overall trajectory or contours of the dance being more or less known to the participants.
These arguments are based on research on the World Bank’s efforts over the course of several decades to encourage, through its financing, projects, and technical assistance, the implementation of social sector reform in Indonesia.
Thematic sections of this issue: Measurement and metrics, governance and state capacity, means of implementation for the 20230 agenda, shocks and resilient education systems, and theoretical and historical considerations.
The introductory essay for the special issue goes beyond a brief description of each of the cases. This article (a) presents a framework for understanding the connections among globalization, privatization, and marginalization in relation to education; (b) distills, visually presents, and expands upon the dialectical connections evident “in” and “through” the cases that make up the special issue; and (c) emphasizes a number of lessons for the globalization-privatization-marginalization nexus.
The papers in this special issue are grouped into two clusters. This grouping reflects the fact that, while all the papers speak to the three core concepts of globalization, privatization, and marginalization, the papers typically place analytic emphasis on two of the three and then consider the implications of their findings for the third. The papers in the first cluster focus on the ways privatization is being advanced through the dynamics of globalization, and then consider the implications for—or the connections to—marginalization. For example, these papers examine how policymaking processes, the provision of refugee education, quasi-market reform politics, international large-scale assessments of student learning, and the work of international non-governmental organizations are all advanced by political and economic globalization in ways that not only open spaces for privatization but also exacerbate marginalization in various forms.
The papers in the second cluster, in contrast, take as their point of departure various forms of privatization, considering directly their consequences for marginalization. These essays are framed with, and then connect back to, the dynamics of globalization. The different forms of privatization discussed by these papers include charter schools, vouchers, neo-vouchers (i.e., tax credits), and private schools that serve low-income families. Although their analytic focus is not squarely trained on the causes of each kind of privatization, the articles do address the contextual factors and the forces of political-economic globalization that have led to, or have contributed to, the form of privatization under study.
In all, the articles report on research from the “Global North”, meaning the United States, Western European and Mediterranean countries (i.e. Portugal, Italy, Israel), and New Zealand, with other studies focusing on the “Global South”, meaning countries in Latin America (i.e., Argentina, Chile, Peru), Africa (Zambia), and Asia (with two papers focused on India). One paper focuses on refugee education generally and thus is not focused on a specific geographic context.
Importantly, the articles contained in this special issue include but go beyond a focus on low-income countries. High-income—“developed”—countries are not immune to the effects of globalization and privatization. It is crucial that we understand the ways that these phenomena manifest across different contexts, not least because, across contexts that may seem wildly different, globalization and privatization have similar effects and are the result of similar forces, though the details of how they play out may be distinct.
This project was developed over the course of the past two years or so. We thank the authors for their excellent contributions and the reviewers for their helpful feedback.
We hope this special issue makes a contribution. Please feel free to forward along to colleagues, students, etc.
Best,
Brent Edwards
Alex Means
University of Hawaii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Globalization, Privatization, Marginalization: Mapping and Assessing Connections and Consequences in/through Education
Authors: D. Brent Edwards Jr. and Alexander Means
Section 1: Privatization and Marginalization in/through Globalization
2. “Glocalisation” doctrine in the Israel public education system: A contextual analysis of a policy-making process
Authors: Dvir, Maxwell, & Yemini
3. Education governance and privatization in Portugal: Media attention on the public debate about public and private education
Authors: Fatima Antunes, Sofia Viseu
4. Private encroachment through crisis-making: The privatization of education for refugees
Author: Hang Minh Le
5. Marginalization in education systems: The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) and the failure discourse around the Italian education system
Authors: Goncalves de Freitas, Jacob, & Nozaki
6. “A Problem They Don’t Even Know Exists”: Inequality, Poverty, and Invisible Discourses in Teach First New Zealand
Authors: Oldham & Crawford-Garrett
Section 2: Globalization and Marginalization in/through Privatization
7. Education privatization in the United States: Increasing saturation and segregation
Author: Adamson & Galloway
8. Education markets and schools’ mechanisms of exclusion: The case of Chile
Author: Adrián Zancajo
9. Speaking cooperation, acting competition: Supply-side subsidies and private schools in socioeconomically disadvantaged contexts in Buenos Aires
Authors: Mauro Moschetti, Carolina Snaider
10. Educating on a budget: The subsistence model of low-fee private schooling in Peru
Authors: María Balarin, Clara Fontdevila, Paola Marius, & María Fernanda Rodríguez
11. Low-fee private schools, the State, and globalization: A market analysis within the political sociology of education and development
Authors: Edwards, Okitsu & Mwanza
12. Motivations to set up and manage low-fee private schools in India
Authors: Hannah Mond & Poorvaja Prakash
13. Children’s accounts of labelling and stigmatization in private schools in Delhi, India and the Right to Education Act
Authors: Michael LaFleur, Prachi Srivastava
Issue title: Sociological Contributions to School Choice Policy and Politics Around the Globe
Guest Editors: Amanda Potterton, D. Brent Edwards Jr., Ee-Seul Yoon, and Jeanne Powers
Introduction
1. Sociological Contributions to School Choice Policy and Politics Around the Globe: Introduction to the 2020 PEA Yearbook
Authors: Amanda U. Potterton, D. Brent Edwards Jr., Ee-Seul Yoon, and Jeanne M. Powers
Section I: The Strategies and Responses of Schools and
2. Families to School Choice Policies School Counselors’ Assessment of the Legitimacy of High School Choice Policy
Authors: Carolyn Sattin-Bajaj and Jennifer L. Jennings
3. Schools in the Marketplace: Analysis of School Supply Responses in the Chilean Education Market
Author: Adrián Zancajo
4. Opting for Private Education: Public Subsidy Programs and School Choice in Disadvantaged Contexts
Authors: Mauro Carlos Moschetti and Antoni Verger
5. The Development and Dynamics of Public–Private Partnerships in the Philippines’ Education: A Counterintuitive Case of School Choice, Competition, and Privatization
Authors: Andreu Termes, D. Brent Edwards Jr., and Antoni Verger
Section II: Sociology of School Choice Politics and Education Markets
6. Media Strategies in Policy Advocacy: Tracing the Justifications for Indiana’s School Choice Reforms
Authors: Joel R. Malin, Christopher Lubienski, and Queenstar Mensa-Bonsu
Ideas and the Politics of School Choice Policy: Portfolio Management in Philadelphia
Authors: Rand Quinn and Laura Ogburn
7. Parental Accountability, School Choice, and the Invisible Hand of the Market
Author: Amanda U. Potterton
8. School Choice Research and Politics with Pierre Bourdieu: New Possibilities
Author: Ee-Seul Yoon
Section III: Conflict and Competition for Resources in Organizational and Regulatory Contexts
9. Teacher Power and the Politics of Union Organizing in the Charter Sector
Authors: Huriya Jabbar, Jesse Chanin, Jamie Haynes, and Sara Slaughter
10. Rearranging the Chairs on the Deck or True Reform? Private Sector Bureaucracies 239 in the Age of Choice—An Analysis of Autonomy and Control
Authors: Sarah Butler Jessen and Catherine DiMartino
Commentary
11. Toward a Global Political Sociology of School Choice Policies
Author: Bob Lingard
To address this gap, this book places front and center questions of theory, ontology, epistemology and method related to policy movement. It explores a wide diversity of approaches to help understand the policy movement phenomena, providing a useful guide on global studies in education, as well as insights into the future of this dynamic area of work.
mobilization and global education policy by presenting a novel approach to
studying policy movement. The central purpose of this approach – labelled
bibliographic ethnography – is to highlight the work that bibliographic
references do in the context of academic and organizational texts, while
also keeping one eye on the larger implications of the productive nature of
such citations beyond the limits of the text itself. The approach brings an
ethnographic sensitivity to the analysis of the role that citations play in the
sense that it asks: what kinds of statements or claims are enabled in the context
of academic and organizational texts by the invocation of a given reference?
As will be explained, this analysis is then placed within a second level of
reflection where the researcher assesses the work of citations in relation to
the dominant features of the sociohistorical and political- economic context.
The method we suggest breaks with the internalist reading of texts – in our
case, scientific research and organizational publications on global education
policy – thus enabling us to critically analyze the structures and practices
that grant authority to particular kinds of research in the first place. Analysis
of this kind necessarily has a political dimension, because the underlying
phenomenon itself is political. That is, the issue of who to cite and how
to interpret and instrumentalize existing research has political implications,
even when authors do not have open political intentions with their research.
The central argument is, first, that the programs and projects of international organizations are introduced into and are constrained by multiple layers of rituals, performative acts, and cultural logics, logics that intersect with and reinforce the political, economic, and social structures in and through which they operate. These dynamics are summarized by the term ritual governance, which is defined as the symbolic and standardized behavior in which actors engage as they participate in the “traditions and institutions by which authority in a country is exercised” (Kaufmann et al., 1999, p. 1). As will be seen, the contextual factors that guide governance practices are largely beyond the reach of the international development organizations; the relevant logics have their roots in state ideology but also extend back to the colonial logics that continue to operate at the heart of the state apparatus.
The second central argument is that international aid organizations and the governments with which they work are engaged in a “ritual aid dance” (Bull, 2005) where each actor plays a part but does not (and cannot) acknowledge the ways that it depends on—or at least uses—the other for its own gain. The ritual aid dance is understood as a form of ritual governance, but one that is specific to the relationship between a given government or governments, on one hand, and any organization offering “aid” in the context of international development work, on the other—though it should be noted that the ritual aid dance can also be analyzed in terms of how international organizations engage with each other in order to preserve the legitimacy of the international development enterprise. This process can be considered a dance because each participant responds to and needs the other, and because both sides do so in ways that are carefully choreographed, with the overall trajectory or contours of the dance being more or less known to the participants.
These arguments are based on research on the World Bank’s efforts over the course of several decades to encourage, through its financing, projects, and technical assistance, the implementation of social sector reform in Indonesia.
Book overview:
Why is it so hard for international development organizations—even ones as well-resourced and influential as the World Bank—to generate and sustain change in the way things are done in those countries where they work? Despite what, in many cases, is decades of investment and effort, why do partner governments continue to engage in those traditional patterns and styles of public service management that international development organizations have sought to supplant with methods that are supposedly more accountable, efficient, and effective? This book provides an answer to these questions. Rather than pathologizing partner governments as the source of the problem—that is, rather than maintaining the distinction between doctor (international development organizations) and patient (partner governments), wherein the patient is seen as unwilling to take their medicine (enacting “good governance” practices)—this book instead reframes the relationship.
The central argument is, first, that the programs and projects of international organizations are introduced into and are constrained by multiple layers of rituals, performative acts, and cultural logics, logics that intersect with and reinforce the political, economic, and social structures in and through which they operate. These dynamics are summarized by the term ritual governance, which is defined as the symbolic and standardized behavior in which actors engage as they participate in the “traditions and institutions by which authority in a country is exercised” (Kaufmann et al., 1999, p. 1). As will be seen, the contextual factors that guide governance practices are largely beyond the reach of the international development organizations; the relevant logics have their roots in state ideology but also extend back to the colonial logics that continue to operate at the heart of the state apparatus.
The second central argument is that international aid organizations and the governments with which they work are engaged in a “ritual aid dance” (Bull, 2005) where each actor plays a part but does not (and cannot) acknowledge the ways that it depends on—or at least uses—the other for its own gain. The ritual aid dance is understood as a form of ritual governance, but one that is specific to the relationship between a given government or governments, on one hand, and any organization offering “aid” in the context of international development work, on the other—though it should be noted that the ritual aid dance can also be analyzed in terms of how international organizations engage with each other in order to preserve the legitimacy of the international development enterprise. This process can be considered a dance because each participant responds to and needs the other, and because both sides do so in ways that are carefully choreographed, with the overall trajectory or contours of the dance being more or less known to the participants.
These arguments are based on research on the World Bank’s efforts over the course of several decades to encourage, through its financing, projects, and technical assistance, the implementation of social sector reform in Indonesia.
the operation in practice of those current and recent decentralization and school-based management (SBM) reforms that have been promoted by the World Bank and adopted by the Government of Indonesia. The idea is to go beyond the claims made by either the World Bank or the GOI to critically investigate what is known about decentralization and SBM reforms in the education sector. This is done by drawing on realist evaluation, systems theory, and anthropological sensibilities, which, as explained in chapter two, emphasize the social circumstances, institutional context, political drivers, cultural norms, and wider infrastructural constraints in which the reforms were implemented. Given this purpose, the discussion in this and subsequent chapters around the operation in practice of decentralization reforms focuses on (a) how the reforms were supposed to work, (b) how they worked in implementation, and (c) the reasons for the differences between expectations and the experience of these reforms as reported in existing studies.
survey responses from 87 partners about their contributions to the implementation of ESDfor2030, and conversations with 11 UNESCO field officers working in regional offices.
preferences and strategies in the education domain. It draws on a case study of the participatory process that was organised around the definition of the last
World Bank Education Strategy (WBES2020) and focuses on the participation of three European aid agencies, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development and the Department for International Development of the UK. This paper
acknowledges that a significant effort was made to promote the inclusiveness and transparency of the participatory process, yet it concludes that the conditions for promoting quality participation and substantive policy change were not provided. Furthermore, the way international aid agencies produce and use knowledge limits their role and influence in the context of the Bank’s
consultations. Hence, by not contesting the Bank’s policy ideas substantially, the agencies contribute inadvertently to reproducing the Bank’s predominance in the education for development field.
rethinking of partnership and action. Despite funders and large INGOs embracing a rhetoric of accountability towards populations aected by conict and crisis, their actions remain primarily guided by the social, political and economic interests of their own constituencies and leadership.
Indonesia, D. Brent Edwards Jr. employs the concepts of “ritual
governance” and the “ritual aid dance” to refer to the performative and
symbolic acts and processes through which change is supposedly pursued,
all while failing to challenge established political, economic, and social
structures – a phenomenon that is arguably widespread in international
development and education policy.
Singapore’s educational policies and lessons have been exported to other countries tends to focus on the mediating roles of international assessments and global policy actors like the OECD or McKinsey consultants. What has been much less clear is Singapore’s own proactive branding and education export strategies. Guided by the Cultural Political Economy framework,
this paper draws attention to how an enabling global education policy context with an insatiable appetite for fast policy lessons has aligned with Singapore’s own initiatives to cultivate and export its brand of educational success.
case of Colombia’s well-known charter school programme. By employing a strategy that has been labelled bibliographic ethnography, this article not only takes a critical look at the knowledge base that has been produced on this programme but also maps the way that evaluations of this charter school programme, despite their limitations, have been cited
and invoked in academic and organisational publications to project this programme internationally. The article concludes by offering a theoretically-informed discussion of how we should understand the trajectory of impact evaluations (and other knowledge products) as they cross multiple personal, organisational, political, and discursive contexts.
In light of the increasingly common use of the GEP concept, this entry addresses the ways that GEP connects with innovation and social repro- duction. That is, in what follows, we discuss how GEPs, as a form of innovation, can contribute to the reproduction of inequality at multiple levels from the local to the global. The following sections address, first, the emergence of GEPs in the post-World War II context and, second, the vari- ous forms that GEPs have tended to take, with these forms being seen as innovations in education policy that contribute to changing the common sense around education reform in the context of globalization.
and facilitated the establishment and refinement of formalized data analysis processes.
2. More consistent work is needed to build the belief that data matters and to establish and nurture authentic and safe collaborative communities where data use is viewed as meaningful rather than punitive.
3. The most successful approaches among complex areas were those that provided clear expectations and guidance from the complex area level coupled with flexible, school-driven implementation informed by individual school needs.
and practitioners of some significant weaknesses and internal contradictions
of randomised control trials (RCTs). Although critiques throughout the years from education scholars have pointed to the detrimental effects of this experimental approach on education practice and values, RCTs are considered the gold standard for assessing the impact of education policies and interventions. By drawing on the approach of immanent critique, we elucidate substantial argumentative gaps between the assumptions and applications – that is, between the theory and reality – of RCTs in empirical
research. This kind of analytic exercise complements existing critiques
from outside the experimental discourse based on moral and epistemic principles. The present paper, in contrast, contributes to the literature by highlighting internal limitations and contradictions that can be seen by probing the logic espoused by those who are proponents of RCTs. In fleshing out our argument, we seek to encourage more informed and critical engagement by educators, policymakers, and researchers, among other stakeholders, when they are confronted with proposals for education programmes and reforms supported by findings from RCTs.
to the debate on how to incorporate systems thinking concepts and principles into the assessment of education policies and interventions, hence inviting different audiences to see the merits of this approach in informing
education policy debates. The ideas we discuss emerged in the context
of the evaluation of the implementation process of a large-scale educational
intervention in Colombia between late 2018 and mid-2019.1 The
Colombian Full-Day Schooling programme (or JU, for its acronym in
Spanish2) has been described by researchers from the Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) as ‘an opportunity to
test an inter-institutional coordination model (…) to plan and implement
various multiyear school improvement strategies’ (Radinger et al., 2018,
p. 118). Therefore, our assessment of JU entailed navigating between the
processes and social interactions happening simultaneously at different
levels (e.g., the national, subnational and local) of the Colombian education
system. Hence, the experience we report here is a testimony to the
feasibility and advantages of thinking systematically about educational
interventions in the context of non-academic projects and under the
budget and time constraints of decision-oriented policy research.
This program has a long history that goes back to the 1970s (and beyond) and is linked with a series of World Bank-funded projects. Just as importantly, the trajectory of this program has significantly impacted the emergence, evolution, and prominence (or lack thereof) of other governance reforms in the education sector, such as school-based management and low-fee private schools. The present report seeks to examine these issues, with the purpose being to understand the trajectory, politics, and implications of the PNPM program generally and the ways that it has enabled (or not) reforms in the education sector related to school-based management and low-fee private schools. Throughout, this report also focuses on the influence of the World Bank, the way that this organization’s influence has changed over time, and the mechanisms through which the World Bank has exercised that influence. Put differently, this study uses the PNPM program as an entry point into governance reform dynamics within and beyond the education sector in Indonesia between the government and the World Bank.
The findings presented here document how the World Bank creates and uses parallel programs outside of the core government bureaucracy. Not only do World Bank projects build on these programs over time but this institution is able to take advantage of moments of crisis to expand and adapt them. In Indonesia, the financial crisis of the late 1990s provided an opportunity for the World Bank further scale up the general community block grant program it had been supporting (the predecessor to PNPM) while also transferring the block grant model to realm of education (where it would serve as the predecessor to the government’s school-based management program).
Separately, while the relationship between the World Bank and the Indonesian government has been rocky at times, World Bank technical assistance has been consistent over a long period of time reaching back into the 1960s. This technical assistance has taken the form of policy advice, program management and implementation, research, monitoring and evaluation, pilot testing new programs, training, coordination of donor initiatives, management of trust funds of donor resources, and chairing consultative forums, among other examples. However, while the World Bank has certainly been influential thanks to this assistance and through the immense financial resources it has leant to Indonesia over the years (estimated at USD$30 billion during 1968-2004 alone), this report also discusses reasons to nuance our understanding of World Bank influence, particularly at the sub-national level where this institution has continually wrestled with political and organizational factors that are beyond its control and which have hampered the realization in practice of neoliberal governance reforms that circumvent the central state apparatus and that attempt to institute relations of accountability at the community level.
promoted and adapted around the world. The findings – based on two years of data collection – demonstrate not only the way these contexts can
be particularly susceptible to intervention by foreign governments and international organizations but also how, in certain historical-structural moments, those contexts can be transformed and leveraged to experiment with and to entrench certain policies.
• Inicia Educación, formerly Fundación Inicia, is an example of the shift from traditional to new philanthropy, shifting towards adopting a business mindset and a clearer involvement with policymaking.
• As an example of new philanthropy, Inicia Educación holds significant influence on shaping education policy and now seeks to use its leverage to generate profit through an associated for-profit consulting firm.
• The task going forward is to examine how political–economic considerations have facilitated the emergence and strengthening
of these organizations and contributed to the weak position of states vis-à-vis such actors.
student retention and dropout in Cambodia. This followed students as they
transitioned from primary school (Grade 6) to lower secondary school (Grade 9) – a period when private tutoring is increasingly important for academic success. The study included three rounds of data collection in ten communities (three urban, three rural, and four remote). In each community, ten student- parent pairs were interviewed once at the end of Grade 6, once in the middle of Grade 8, and for a fi nal time in the middle of Grade 9. Narrative methods were used to understand both the role of private tutoring in students’ schooling experience and the implications of private tutoring in students’ lives more generally. Cross- case analysis was then used to generate insights about private tutoring practices that are common across study participants. 1 As the original study did not include interviews with teachers, we supplemented our fi ndings with other studies that have examined the voices and perspectives of Cambodian teachers (for example,
VSO Cambodia, 2008 ; Brehm, 2015 ; Ogisu & Williams, 2016 ).
Importantly, the paper highlights that lower income quintiles spend a greater percentage of their income on ECCE, and that a majority of families in the study must make tradeoffs between ECCE, food, housing, and other basic expenditures in order to afford private ECCE, which is a necessity given the inadequate supply of government ECCE centers. In
addition to addressing school strategies for keeping costs down, this study reports on parental decision-making when it comes to school selection. Finally, beyond a straight market analysis of LFPSs at the ECCE level in Zambia, this article also comments on how this market fits into the dialectical nature of local and global contexts. That is, it draws
attention to the workings of the Zambian state and its precarious position in the global capitalist economy.
strengthening of public education but through the establishment of public–private partnerships.
Focus of Study: In this paper we explore the Kenyan government’s engagement with LFPSs, document and assess the impact of this support on the behavior of LFPS and clarify key actor perspectives and responses within this context.
Research Design: Through a qualitative case study of two LFPSs in a large urban informal settlement near Nairobi, we focus on the dynamic interaction and delicate equilibrium within which government officials, LFPS representatives, parents, and students not only interact with but influence each other. Data for the study were gathered over the course of 8 weeks during May and June of 2010 in the urban slum called Mathare Village in Nairobi through document review, 35 interviews, and school visits.
Conclusions: The findings suggest that LFPSs do not function in practice as in theory, and crucially, that there are inherent trade-offs, tensions, and unexpected dynamics in operation that have serious consequences for such issues as quality and equity, even when supported by formal government policy designed to address these aspects. The study reinforces the importance of national governments and international bodies increasing the resources devoted to improving access to, and the quality of, public education.
supplemental health and medical services, after-school clubs, weekend engagement, university scholarships, and teacher support (e.g., no-interest loans for post-bachelor’s study), among others. Implications for future research are discussed, including the need for studies to distinguish among types of charter schools. The paper concludes that, when addressing the costs and benefits of charter schools in Colombia, we need to ask: Costs in what sense? Benefits for whom? And at whose expense?
Focus of Study: The purpose of this paper is to uncover and present the strategies that charter schools employ for managing teachers and acquiring resources, and with what implications.
Research Design: Through a qualitative case study of a charter school program in Bogotá, Colombia that began in 1999, we investigated (a) the regulations that governed the hiring, firing, and compensation of charter school teachers, in addition to (b) how charters respond to those regulations in contracting teachers and (c) the overall approach of charter principals and the charter management organizations (CMO) that oversee them when it comes to teacher engagement, collaboration, supervision, and professional development. In terms of resource acquisition, the focus was on understanding (d) the extent of government-provided resources to charter schools, (e) the perceptions of charter principals and CMO directors of the resources provided by the government, (f) the ways in which these actors have sought to complement these resources, and (g) the kinds of additional resources that have been obtained. Data in the form of documents, archives, literature and evaluations, and qualitative interviews were collected over eight months.
Conclusions: Findings indicate that charter school teachers in Bogotá feel that many aspects of their work environment are positive, though they also report tradeoffs in terms of job security and financial compensation. Charter schools use the flexibility afforded to them around employment to spend half as much on teachers by hiring non-unionized teachers, contracting them for periods of a year or less, assigning teachers to lower compensation categories, and offering significantly lower salaries, despite teachers working over 12 hours more each week than their public school counterparts. Findings with regard to resource acquisition address differences between public and charter schools, perceptions of school leaders, and the routes to resource acquisition used by charter schools, namely: budget prioritization, donations, volunteers, partnerships, and alumni networks. Implications for future research are discussed, including the need for studies to distinguish among types of charter schools. The article concludes that, when addressing the costs and benefits of charter schools, we need to ask: Costs in what sense? Benefits for whom? And at whose expense?
In "Theory versus Reality in Charter Schools in Colombia," D. Brent Edwards Jr. and Hilary Hartley go beyond assessing academic outcomes to examine the process of authorization, evaluation, and enrollment to determine the degree of accountability and choice. Edwards and Hartley conclude that choice has been limited by inadequate supply, in turn curtailed by insufficient funding necessary for new Concession Schools to meet government standards; and that accountability has been compromised by the absence of a clear and common set of criteria.
Edwards and Hartley base their findings on interviews with parents, principals of both Concessions Schools and neighboring traditional public schools, evaluators working for the Bogotá School System, and officials at the Colombian Ministry of Education; on quantitative and qualitative evaluations of schools; and on visits to both Concessions Schools and traditional public schools. The result is not only a detailed depiction of educational privatization in Bogotá but also an instructive tableau of foreign practice for comparative analysis.
into the experience of average communities in the EDUCO program. In the end, beyond presenting new and little-known insights into the community-level reality of the EDUCO program, this chapter reflects on the implications of these insights for (a) the theory and assumptions behind such models of community-level management, (b) the national and global-level politics of the decentralization trends in education that have been predominant since the early 1990s, and (c) the possibility of democratization from below. In addition to the above-mentioned foci, the chapter begins with a brief characterization of community-based management (CBM) and the research that has been conducted on this phenomenon.
transnational network of civil society organizations. Through an in-depth case study, this chapter details how NEP not only navigated the globalization of educational governance in Cambodia but also impacted the structures of national educational governance by becoming an active member in policymaking. This chapter shows how NEP made it to the proverbial “decision making table” in Cambodian educational governance by strategically using its global connections while tactically navigating the historical
and political context.
the use of narrative research methods in interviews with student-parent pairs in urban, rural, and remote communities in Cambodia.
un proyecto mayor que incluyó el análisis de la información recogida de entrevistas en profundidad con actores clave del campo de la política educativa, la revisión de fuentes históricas y de la literatura teórica sobre política educativa global, economía política, teoría del sistema-mundo y estudios postcoloniales. Se define lo que llamamos “ethos de privatización”, una forma de privatización inherente al Estado postcolonial referida al hecho de que el beneficio privado es la lógica que guía el funcionamiento del sistema.
Enmarcada inicialmente en un programa de 'modernización' del Estado, a principios de 1990 la descentralización educativa comenzó tibiamente con la aplicación del primer Programa de Ajuste Estructural de la economía, impuesto por el gobierno conservador del Partido Nacional, coincidiendo con la implementación de las reformas de SBM (administración basada en la escuela, por sus siglas en inglés), en los países vecinos. Sin embargo, no fue hasta finales de los años 90 que Honduras implementó su propio programa de SBM, el denominado Proyecto Hondureño de Educación Comunitaria (PROHECO), en virtud de la ventana de oportunidad que significó la crisis humanitaria tras el paso del huracán Mitch en 1998.
En la actualidad, con un Estado ausente, heredero de una larga historia de renuncia a su responsabilidad como garante del derecho fundamental a una educación de calidad, se advierten una serie de tendencias hacia la privatización que avanzan y se manifiestan bajo modalidades y trayectorias diferentes. Al margen del programa PROHECO, interesa llamar la atención sobre siete tendencias recientes de privatización educativa:
despedir y contratar a los maestros a nivel de la comunidad. A pesar de la atención que ha recibido dicho programa, muchos aspectos clave de su trayectoria e impacto han sido subestimados. En este artículo se ofrece una reinterpretación de EDUCO al explicitar la emergencia de este programa, su historia oculta y sus resultados menos conocidos.
Como se demuestra, EDUCO no solo emergió antes de terminar la guerra gracias a la actividad política del partido conservador ARENA, sino también debido al rol de organizaciones internacionales como la USAID (Agencia de Desarrollo Internacional de los EEUU), UNESCO (Organización de las Naciones Unidas para la Educación, la Ciencia y la Cultura) y el Banco
Mundial. En relación a la implementación del programa, el artículo muestra como la práctica y el funcionamiento del programa estuvieron caracterizados por numerosas limitaciones y efectos adversos. El análisis presentado nos ofrece una reinterpretación de EDUCO cuyo valor radica en la posibilidad de estimular una forma diferente de pensar acerca de las relaciones entre la educación, el desarrollo comunitario y la guerra civil.
Todos deberíamos cuestionar la validez de un argumento de alguien que dice estar cumpliendo con su responsabilidad académica, pero que no muestra pruebas de involucrarse seriamente con la evidencia de la explicación en disputa. Nuestras dudas deberían ser aún mayores cuando no se demuestra la capacidad de leer con cuidado o cuando se hacen críticas a cosas que nunca se dijeron.
columna, Óscar descalifica varios de los hallazgos, dejando en evidencia que no había leído de forma rigurosa las publicaciones en las cuales se basaron. Todo lo que digo en mi artículo ha sido investigado y explicado detalladamente en mis varias publicaciones académicas, que incluyen no
sólo un libro sino numerosos artículos (aún escritos en español). No es mi costumbre responder a columnas de opinión sobre mi trabajo científico y tampoco lo haré esta vez, sin embargo, dado el manto de duda que pudo haber generado sus ligeros comentarios sobre la seriedad de mi trabajo, me permito escribir este comunicado, no en respuesta a Óscar, sino en beneficio de las personas que deseen ir más allá de la opinión y quieran ir directo a las evidencias disponibles. Algo que él no hizo. Paso entonces a ilustrar cada punto con algunas de las evidencias disponibles. Debo decir que este ejercicio no resultará difícil en tanto que todo está detallado en mis otras publicaciones sobre el tema.
globalization affects educational policy and practice in a multitude of ways from early childhood education through advanced graduate studies. Educational policy, at every level, impacts education and affects the daily lives of educators and practitioners throughout the Pacific Asia
region. The impact of globalization, and resistance to it, shows up in such educational contexts as the curriculum, leadership, testing, “World English,” technology, and access/equity in education. The courses in this program will focus on topical issues that are common to all educational
systems and are appropriate for education professionals in diverse geographical locations.
Join a vibrant community of exceptional scholars and professionals from the continental North America, Hawai‘i, and Asia to explore the world of educational policy through a globalization lens. The online program
features ongoing, synchronous discussions that permit continuous dialogue and inquiry among participants across the Pacific Ocean. While most of the assignments and lectures can be accessed by students on their own time, weekly discussions will bring everyone together. Classes are online and require a computer with a microphone, speaker, and a dedicated internet link.
The program will entail a short-term face-to-face component at the University of Hawai‘i. Scheduling for this aspect of the program will be decided in consultation with student schedules and will be set for either Summer 2018 or Summer 2019.