Seeing like the state, calculating like a business: PPP revisited. Part II Public education and the adoption of business logic

Session Submission Type: Group Panel

Description of Session

The close collaboration between the public and private for-profit sectors, advanced as part and parcel of managerial reforms of the past twenty years has blurred the boundaries of how the two types of providers conceive, design and speak of basic educational services and goods. The private sector has adopted concepts from the public domain and thereby attempts to speak the language of the public sector by emphasizing issues of learning and quality of education. Vice-versa, the public sector seems to emphasize the cost-effectiveness of its endeavors and has introduced, among others, a creeping scheme of a fee structure (free education for basic services but parental contribution for all extra services and goods), lowering investment in teacher education, and promoting an economy of scale for introducing the same standards, textbooks, and the same 21st century skills regardless of national education system etc. While the vocabulary of commitment to inclusiveness, nurture of diversity, and multiple paths for individual journeys to the acquiring of skills and competencies is still used, the mass production model has become the more accepted one in both national and international circles. Scripted teaching, international standardization of process and desired outcomes, and a focus on measurable performance are the benchmarks of a manufacturing approach. The adoption of private sector language and techniques for education thrives on a narrative of failure of public institutions and trust in the private sector as the favorable alternative.

The two panels will examine the consequences of these developments by analyzing the impact that PPPs, voucher schemes, for-profit fee-based basic education and other forms of public support for the private sector have had on public education, in particular, on promises of ensuring equality, serving the common good, and promoting equitable quality learning opportunities for all.

Ten or twenty years after PPP was imposed on the education sector, the two sectors have become in many regards alike. What aspects of public education are especially at risk of taking on a logic of the private sector? Do we see the contours of a “scandalization industry,” accompanying international large-scale student assessments (ILSAs) such as PISA, PISA-D, IEA studies, and regional ILSAs? Even though the private sector directly benefits from the scandalization of the public education system, do government officials sometimes welcome the attack against public education because it enables them to mobilize financial resources and build political coalitions for introducing reforms? What is the role of the various policy actors (businesses, transnational actors, non-governmental organizations) in weakening public education and how do they differ in their strategies and approaches? What is happening in countries where the privatization of education has reached such a high volume that the middle class has started to show a disinterest to further support the public sector financially and economically, and has created its own parallel educational system, funded from public as well as private means.

This panel is co-organized by NORRAG, Education International and the Open Societies Foundations. The papers presented at the two panels will form part of a volume of collected papers issued as an open-access publication in several languages as part of NORRAG’s thematic focus area “global governance”.

Sub Unit

• SIG: Economics and Finance of Education

Chair

• Nikola Wachter, Education International

Individual Presentations

• Defining a framework for public private partnerships in education - Mireille De Koning, Open Society Foundations

• Bridge International Academies: Seeing like a state, calculating like a business - Curtis Riep, Doctoral Student at University of Alberta

• Profiting from the Poor: The Edu-Solutions Industry in Hyderabad - Carol Anne Spreen, New York University; Sangeeta Kamat, University of Massachusetts Amherst

• Private participation in the education of Syrian refugees: Understanding the roles of businesses and foundations - Zeena Zakharia, University of Massachusetts Boston; Francine Menashy, University of Massachusetts Boston

Discussant

• Gita Steiner-Khamsi, Columbia University