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Aaron Benavot,Julia Resnik, and Javier Corrales
Global Educational
Expansion
Historical Legacies and Political Obstacles
©2006 by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 0-87724-055-8
The views expressed in this volume are those held by each contributor and are not
necessarily those of the Officers and Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and
Sciences or its Project on Universal Basic and Secondary Education.
Please direct inquiries to:
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
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Contents
v PREFACE
1 CHAPTER 1
Lessons from the Past: AComparative Socio-Historical Analysis of
Primary and Secondary Education
Aaron Benavot and Julia Resnik
91 CHAPTER 2
Political Obstacles to Expanding and Improving Schooling in
Developing Countries
Javier Corrales
149 CONTRIBUTORS
PREFACE
v
Preface
The reasons for providing all the world’s children with high-quality primary
and secondary education are numerous and compelling. Education provides
economic benefits and improves health. Education is a widely accepted
humanitarian obligation and an internationally mandated human right.
These claims are neither controversial nor new. In 1990, the international
community resoundingly pledged to achieve universal basic education by
2000, and later extended its deadline to 2015. The unanimity of commitment
and shortfall in achievement raise a fundamental question. If universal educa-
tion is suchagood idea, why don’t we have it already?
As part of the American Academy’s Universal Basic and Secondary
Education (UBASE)Project, we asked this question of Aaron Benavot, Julia
Resnik, and Javier Corrales. Benavot and Resnik considered the history and
legacy of efforts to achieve universal basic and secondary education. Corrales
examined the present political obstacles to and incentives for expanding and
improving education where it is most scarce. Their findings, published here,
provide a healthy dose of realism to estimates of the scale of the UBASE chal-
lenge. But by illuminating the challenges, they also render them finite.
In explaining the elusiveness of universal primaryand secondary educa-
tion, Benavot and Resnik call attention to the enormous progress to date and
the complexity of the work remaining. They examine the emergence of com-
pulsory education laws, the transformation of diverse educational frame-
works into formal school systems, the problems of inequality that have aris-
en, and the role played by international organizations in creating an
increasingly interconnected global education system.
On the basis of this geographically broad comparative history, the authors
offer an essential observation and an important suggestion. The observation is
that despite the apparent uniformity in contemporary schooling, past educa-
tional models took many forms, and motivations for educational expansion
varied widely. The suggestion is that international organizations seeking to
facilitate educational expansion need to be attuned to this varied history if
their interventions are to succeed. Benavot and Resnik recount, for example,
that when leaders advocated the decentralization of education in Latin
American countries in the 1980s, they ignored the specific social and political
purposes for which those schools had been founded, which included ending
severe socioeconomic segregation. Decentralization led to a growth of private
schools and renewed fragmentation along class lines, which exacerbated the
social divide that school centralization was initially intended to correct. The
implication is clear: global education advocates, donors, and policy makers
who ignore history do so at considerable peril.
Where Benavot and Resnik emphasize the historical legacies with which
policy makers must contend, Corrales highlights the weak, conflicting, and at
times perverse political incentives facing those interested in expanding and
improving education. Corrales finds that, overall, international sources of
leverage are weak. Even as globalization proceeds, the demand for highly
skilled labor is mixed—some industries require an educated labor pool while
others seek labor that is cheap and relatively unskilled. Multilateral lending
institutions have emphasized education more in recent years. Corrales cites
evidence, however, that funds earmarked for education are sometimes divert-
ed for other purposes. Within countries, state authorities rarely face strong
political pressures to expand or improve their educational systems. Societal
demand for education is frequently weakest in poor regions or countries
where it is most needed. Corrales argues that past state motivations to pro-
vide education—to consolidate national identity, win citizen loyalty, or neu-
tralize rival political groups—were most prominent when nationalist, revolu-
tionary, and totalitarian ideologies drove political development. Today, these
rationales areless relevant.
Corrales discusses policies that might reinforce the positive incentives for
expanding education. These policies, he suggests, should be aimed at boost-
ing the demand for education by reducing the cost of schooling to individual
families; building up the capacity of state agencies to deliver education of
high quality; generating additional performance indicators to improve the
efficiency of educational delivery; containing opposition to educational
expansion by compensating those most directly threatened; and strengthen-
ing mechanisms for ensuring accountabilityof those at all levels of the educa-
tion system. These areinformed and ambitious proposals, and should stimu-
late necessarydiscussion.
Drafts of each paper were reviewed and discussed by experts at daylong
workshops held at the American Academy in Cambridge, Massachusetts. A
workshop on “The Intellectual and Programmatic History of Universal Basic
and Secondary Education,” was held on September 6–7, 2003 and was attend-
ed by Leslie Berlowitz, David E. Bloom, Cecilia Braslavsky, Colette
Chabbott, Michael Clemens, Joel E. Cohen, Javier Corrales, John Craig,
William K. Cummings, Andy Green, Silvina Gvirtz, George Ingram, Julie
Kennedy, Angela Little, Charles Magnin, Kishore Mahbubani, Martin Malin,
Kenneth Prewitt, and Francisco Ramirez. We join the authors in thanking the
participants for their extremely valuable comments. Benavot and Resnik also
thank Juan Manuel Moreno, António Nóvoa, Yasemin Soysal, and Jón Torfi
Jónasson who made helpful comments.Two anonymous reviewers provided
constructive written comments. Benavot acknowledges the generous support
of the International Bureau of Education during the paper’s completion.
A workshop on “The Political Obstacles to Universal Basic and Secondary
Education” was held on February 27, 2003. Participating were: David E.
Bloom, BarbaraBruns, Claudio de MouraCastro, Joel E. Cohen, Merilee
Grindle, George Ingram, Robert LeVine, Kishore Mahbubani, Martin
Malin, Lant Pritchett, Jeffrey Puryear, Gene Sperling, and Camer Vellani. We
thank the workshop participants, Ernesto Schiefelbein, and two anonymous
vi
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
PREFACE
vii
reviewers for their generous comments. Corrales is also grateful to Ashley
Bates and Jonathan Borowsky, who provided research assistance at different
stages of the project, and to Joan M. Nelson. A special thanks is due to Helen
Curry at the American Academy, whose copy-editing and project coordina-
tion have been indispensable. Leslie Berlowitz’s vision and leadership as chief
executive officer of the American Academy made this project possible.
The UBASE project focuses on the rationale, the means, and the conse-
quences of providing the equivalent of a primary and secondary education of
quality to all the world’s children. Access to primary school has increased
sharply in recent decades in most of the developing world, to levels that, in
some regions, approach those in developed countries. But secondary school
attendance, which has also risen rapidly, is still substantially lower in develop-
ing countries than in the developed countries. The quality of the education
offered at the primary and secondary levels leaves much to be desired, as
judged by examination of a wide range of inputs, outputs, and practices of
educational systems in most developing countries.
This monograph is one in a series of the UBASE project published by the
American Academy. Other papers examine related topics, including:
•basic facts about education, and the nature and quality of the data that
underpin these facts;
•the goals of primary and secondary education in different settings, and
how progress toward those goals is assessed;
•means of implementing universal education, and the evaluation of these
means;
•consequences of achieving universal primary and secondary schooling;
•health and education;
•the costs of achieving universal education at the primaryand secondary
levels.
The complexityof achieving universal basic and secondaryeducation
extends beyond the bounds of any single discipline and necessitates discipli-
naryrigor as well as interdisciplinary,international, and cross-professional
collaboration. By focusing on both primary and secondary education, paying
attention to access, quality, and cultural diversity, and encouraging fresh per-
spectives, we hope that the UBASE projectwill accelerate and enrich educa-
tional development.
This project is supported by a generous grant from the William and Flora
Hewlett Foundation, and by grants from John Reed, the Golden Family
Foundation, Paul Zuckerman, an anonymous donor, and the American
Academy of Arts and Sciences. The project also benefits from the advice of a
distinguished advisory committee, whose names are listed at the back of this
volume.
As with all Occasional Papers of the American Academy, responsibility for
the views presented here rests with the authors.
Joel E. Cohen David E. Bloom Martin Malin
Rockefeller and HarvardUniversity American Academy of
Columbia Universities Arts and Sciences
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
1
CHAPTER 1
Lessons from the Past:
A Comparative
Socio-Historical Analysis
of Primary and
Secondary Education
AARON BENAVOT AND JULIA RESNIK
INTRODUCTION
The foremost policyaim of educational elites and international organizations
dedicated to education is to enable everyyoung child in the world to exercise
his or her right to a qualityeducation by means of national frameworks of uni-
versal schooling.The notion of education as a basic human right, initially laid
out in Article 26 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, has been
reiterated in numerous international covenants and conventions (UNESCO,
2000).Because children cannot secure access to a quality education for them-
selves, state officials, regional authorities, and local communities are morally
obligated to establish the means by which universal access to education
becomes a reality. Moreover, the idea of education as a fundamental human
right is increasingly supplemented by a view that underscores the intrinsic
value of education as an experience that enhances each and every individual’s
capabilities and freedoms (Sen, 1999). Thus, educational expansion can be
understood as a form of development in and of itself,which moves beyond
conventional ideas about the impact of education on economic and national
development. Undoubtedly, the worldwide circulation of these moral, legal,
and social imperatives concerning education has helped to justify the tremen-
dous allocation of resources, by national governments and international agen-
cies alike, to provide education for all (UNESCO,2002; 2003/4).
This paper explores the historical bases of the idea of universal education
and of efforts to realize this goal, as well as the conditions that facilitated (or
hindered) these in different times and places. It seeks to move beyond exist-
ing avenues of scholarly inquiry and sketches out an alternative strategy for a
comparative historical study of universal education. By identifying key analyt-
ical components of the contemporary conception of mass schooling and
examining their historical emergence, this paper focuses on the diverse
antecedents of existing models of universal education and revisits the unique
pathways and divergent outcomes of past models. We liken our strategy to
standing over a rich and flavorful “educational” broth, in which the initially
distinct and numerous ingredients have settled to the bottom of the pot. We
wish to stir up and reexamine the savory (and often forgotten) ingredients
lying at the base of the soup cauldron, which are perceived as having fused
together into a standard framework of universal education. By doing so, we
hope to raise new questions and ideas, which are relevant to current policy
debates on universal education.
Viewed from a world-historical perspective, the long-term trend towards
universal education can be characterized as follows: Under varying economic,
cultural, and political conditions, public mass schooling expanded and under-
went initial consolidation in the West during the late eighteenth and early
nineteenth centuries. The idea that young people needed to undergo special
forms of socialization and training in public schools, rather than at home or
through religious institutions, gained favor. The public increasingly viewed
school-based experiences as important because the parameters of adult life
werenot fixed at birth and because social progress depended on the actions,
choices, and inclinations of a society’s members. The rhetoric and realities of
mass public education werelater selectively adapted in non-European and
colonial education systems during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Over time, education in general, and compulsorymass schooling in particular,
underwent significant institutionalization owing to the decisions of independ-
ent nation-states and the declarations of international associations and organi-
zations.Transnational networks and international organizations played a par-
ticularly influential role in the development of mass schooling in Asia, Africa,
and Latin America, especially after World War II, insofar as they impelled
modernizing elites to facilitate the circulation, emulation, and adoption of
Western educational models and the adaptation of these models to local con-
texts.Overall, the expansion of national education systems, the diffusion of
comparative accounts of schooling,and the diverse activities of international
organizations laid the groundwork for the emergence of a relatively uniform
model of mass, state-sponsored schooling. They also contributed to the con-
vergence of basic educational realities in much of the world today.
1
The present paper deconstructs existing conceptions of the development
of a uniform, undifferentiated model of mass schooling (Boli et al., 1985;
Ramirez and Boli, 1987; Meyer et al., 1992) by examining key historical
processes and institutions that contributed to the drive for universal educa-
2
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
1. Mass schooling can be examined on at least two levels. First, it can be understood as an
evolving reality of schools, teachers, pupils, curriculum, educational laws, statutes, and so
forth. Second, it can be seen as a social construct or model that conceives, accounts for,
theorizes and, moreoften than not, celebrates this reality, especially its contribution to
desirable societal outcomes (e.g., economic development, nation building, social equality,
political revitalization) and individual-level transformations (e.g., literacy acquisition, skill
enhancement, rational behavior, value changes). Although developments at each level are
intertwined and mutually reinforcing, we believe that it is analytically advantageous to keep
them separate.
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
3
tion. We sketch a historical geography of the diverse, often context-specific,
meanings and institutional forms of education, and explore the different his-
torical trajectories along which these elements developed. Although some ele-
ments eventually fused into a relatively standard model of universal, free,
compulsory mass schooling, others remained inextricably bound to particular
times and places and, in a sense, have been lost to all but a few specialists in
educational history.
The analytical strategy employed in this paper, though “unconventional,”
complements recent scholarship in the field of comparative education. For
example, in his historical survey of primary education in Africa, Kenneth King
(1990: 216) discusses the importance of “untangling the threads that led to the
formation of state systems.” Recent work by William Cummings (2003) also
emphasizes the need to examine variations that eventually coalesced into more
standardized forms in modern education systems. Notions of “culture-specific
diversification” and “domestic reflections on education,”as discussed by
Juergen Schriewer and his colleague (Schriewer and Martinez, 2003), are
certainly relevant to the historical approach employed below.
On its own, a comparative analysis of key historical processes and institu-
tional forms has considerable academic merit. Moreover, we reason that this
strategy represents a potentially informative contribution to ongoing policy
debates concerning universal basic and secondary education (UBASE). If, as we
shall argue, muchof the institutional diversityin educational historyhas either
been ignored or forgotten in contemporarydiscourse, then revisiting past
meanings and forms of education should, at least in theory,broaden the con-
ceptual basis upon whichalternative policies and intervention strategies are
evaluated. Having said this, the present paper does not presume to provide a
comprehensive comparative historyof mass schooling (a daunting,if not
impossible task).At this juncture, we simply highlight several key analytical ele-
ments in the historyof mass schooling,as a point of departurefor further work.
The key analytical topics discussed in this paper arecompulsoryschooling
and its prolongation, the transformation of diverse educational frameworks
into formal school systems, inequalityand equityissues, and the institutional-
ization of the global education system.
Legal-Institutional Conditions
A major issue in achieving universal education is the degree to which the state
(or a legally constituted political authority) is committed to providing educa-
tional services for all children in particular age groups. The establishment of
legal provisions for free and compulsory education—thus universal and inclu-
sive in intended scope—is considered a necessary, though insufficient, condi-
tion for the guarantee of formal education to all school-age children.
We survey select issues relating to the establishment, substance, and pro-
longation of compulsory education laws and statutes. Histories of compulso-
ry mass schooling typically focus on the date at which different countries (or
polities) passed a law, constitutional provision, or legal statute requiring par-
ents to enroll their school-age children. Many such studies describe the social,
economic, and/or political forces that affected the passage of compulsory
school laws. We argue, however, that the scholarly literature has had less to
say about the nature of compulsory education laws, the exact parameters of
such laws and their effects over time.
Our analysis of compulsory schooling laws seeks to convey an important
point: In the West and elsewhere, the historical record with respect to the
legal-institutional conditions of mass schooling is profoundly diverse.
Compulsory, state-sponsored schooling emerged from extremely heteroge-
neous legal frameworks and initial conditions. It is not that laws were not
instrumental factors; rather, they had different intended meanings and conse-
quences in different settings.
Systemization Processes
Universal basic education, as currently conceived, depends on the ability of
national governments to organize sequences of relatively uniform classroom
activities in authorized schools as part of an integrated national system. Thus,
acritical aspect of a comparative history of mass schooling is discussion of the
following question: How did different national polities each construct a rela-
tively integrated and standardized national school system out of diverse exist-
ing establishments, sponsoring bodies, training frameworks, and educational
programs, many of which were independent, isolated, or unrelated?
Wediscuss historical patterns in the formation, integration, and standard-
ization of state education systems.These analytical issues describe the types of
initiatives, problems, dilemmas, and solutions that confronted political
authorities in the past, as they set out to create an educational whole out of
diverse, semi-related, and often non-existent parts.Not only did this entail
the definition of legal provisions for public schooling,but also the empower-
ment of legitimate central authorities with administrative powers and capaci-
ties to oversee the day-to-dayoperation of an expanding public school sys-
tem. In many instances this involved integrating competing loyalties via
state-church-community alliances or replacing existing bases of loyalty (e.g.,
local, religious, linguistic) with a unified national identityby confronting or
co-opting local elites and church authorities.
Specifically our analyses focus on following three systemization process-
es: 1) creating an integrated national system of mass education in which clear
links are established between elementary, secondary, and higher education; 2)
determining the level of centralization or decentralization in the governance
and finance of the education system; and 3) determining the extent to which
the state recognizes (and incorporates) schools and educational programs
established by private organizations or religious associations.
Inequalityand Equity Issues
Embedded in the notion of universal education is the assumption that all
children, regardless of race, sex, religion, ethnicity, class, or residence, should
have equal access to basic schooling and courses of study, at least during the
years of compulsory education. Social and cultural inequalities in access and
4
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
5
attainment have been endemic throughout their history of public school sys-
tems: from periods of early consolidation to later expansion.
In addition to uneven rates of educational expansion, institutional poli-
cies (e.g., selection practices, entrance examinations) and structures (e.g.,
elite, comprehensive, diversified or vocational/technical secondary schooling)
contributed to persistent patterns of unequal access and participation in
European and North American schools. In southern hemisphere countries, a
heightened concern for equity principles revealed gross social, gender, and
spatial inequalities in basic educational services, grade retention, and school
dropout rates. The under-representation of girls in primary schools highlight-
ed other gender issues like coeducation. Single-sex schooling and gender-spe-
cific educational programs, which were an integral part of the early history of
mass schooling, lost legitimacy in favor of mixed-sex schools and classrooms
and “gender-neutral” policies. Finally, the circulation of equity principles
governing modern education also exposed disparities in school enrollments
between majority and minority groups and between urban and rural popula-
tions, tendencies that increasingly came to be defined as objectionable.
Our discussion of educational inequalityand equity issues focuses on two
historical problems in relation to UBASE:1) comparative and historical varia-
tions in access to secondaryschool programs, and 2) the changing elitist and
academic nature of secondary schooling.
2
We survey changing institutional
structures governing secondaryeducation, as well as problems accompanying
the transformation of highly selective, academically oriented institutions into
morecomprehensive, diversified, and multi-purpose systems that integrate
most young people in age-delineated categories.Wealso discuss how the
experiences of communist countries illustrate ongoing dilemmas between
academic and vocational studies and between the commitment to egalitarian-
ism and the encouragement of high achievement in education. The example
of Cuba, in particular,throws light on the ways in whichcomprehensive
reforms can facilitate widespread educational progress.
International Organizations and Global Models of Mass Schooling
The adoption, emulation, or transformation of dominant educational models
from one context to another is not an especially new phenomenon (Phillips
and Ochs, 2004). What has changed is the nature of educational knowledge
transfers—in other words, the reasons for the emulation (adaptation) of
prominent educational models and the conception of relations between
education systems.
2. Due to space considerations, a third critical issue—gender inequalities in the develop-
ment of mass education—was set aside. Undoubtedly, historical transformations in the
rules governing the participation of girls and young women in public school systems are an
important aspect of the movement towards universal education. In addition, the ideology
of coeducation and adoption of coeducation policies enabling girls and boys to learn
together (or separately) in schools and classrooms varied significantly both within and
across world regions (see Kandel, 1930: 499–519; Ramirez and Cha, 1990; Tyack and
Hansot, 1990). At the secondary level, the education of girls went hand in hand with the
establishment of teacher certification and normal schools.
We distinguish three types of educational transfer from the historical
record: first, the emulation of a single “successful” educational model (e.g.,
Prussia, later Japan) based on predominantly qualitative observations; sec-
ond, systematic comparisons of a plurality of education systems based on
rudimentary statistical information and descriptive accounts; and third, the
formation of a global educational community (Meyer and Ramirez, 2000;
Chabbott, 2003) in which educational standards, principles, and innovations
circulate in increasingly dense transnational networks, framing discussions
and policy initiatives at the national and sub-national levels. Educational
models emerging from these networks contributed to the continuing conver-
gence of education systems (Resnik, 2001).
In short, we discuss how international organizations emerge as central
actors in their own right during the contemporary period of knowledge
exchange, and contribute to an increasingly interconnected global education
system.
AMethodological Note
The spread of modern education, based on notions of universal access and
equityprinciples, has long been an objectof scholarly and popular attention.
Politicians and publicists have reported their visits to foreign education sys-
tems, scholars have written treatises about the nature and significance of mass
schooling,historians have described past educational reforms and types of
school organization, and governmental agencies have compared school
enrollments in different national settings (see Fraser and Brickman, 1968).
The attention afforded to mass schooling was also enriched by important
institutional developments. For example, the emergence of comparative edu-
cation as an academic field (Holmes, 1981; Halls, 1990; Cowen, 1990;
Schriewer,2000),the publication of educational yearbooks and compendia
(e.g., Columbia University’sEducational Yearbook,IBE’sInternational Yearbook
of Education,UNESCO’sWorld Surveyof Education),the efforts of specialized
national educational agencies (e.g., the U.S.Bureau of Education), the
exchange of information and ideas during international educational confer-
ences (e.g., IBE’s International Conference on Public Education, beginning in
the 1930s) or at education-related exhibits in world fairs (see Waterman,
1893), and the amassing and circulation of comparative accounts of schooling
by international governmental organizations (e.g., UNESCO,World Bank,
OECD)have all contributed to different understandings of the emergence of
universal education, not only as a reality but also as an idea or model.
In order to identify and classify key analytical topics and issues for the
present comparative historical survey of mass schooling, we cast a wide—
albeit far from all-encompassing—net over relevant written documents,
books, and essays. The present paper focuses on a select set of these issues,
which have been classified into the four aforementioned categories. These
categories are not meant to exhaust all relevant (or possible) thematic issues.
For example, the present paper does not discuss the changing nature of edu-
cational goals and aims, the curricular contents of public schooling, gender
6
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
7
inequality, educational financing, teaching training and licensing, minority
and immigrant education, and non-formal education.
The paper is also limited in the range of countries it examines. Many
countries in Western Europe and North America are discussed in consider-
able detail because they represent key cases for understanding the early evolu-
tion of universal education. In addition, educational histories of these coun-
tries are both numerous and relatively rich. We pay particular attention to the
development of mass education in less-developed world regions, mainly
Latin America and Africa. On several occasions, we illustrate our arguments
by presenting examples or counter-examples from India, Malaysia, Thailand,
Cuba and Indonesia.
EXPLORING THE ORIGINS AND EXPANSION
OF UNIVERSAL EDUCATION
Historical explorations of the ideaof universal education and of educational
expansion can be broadly classified into two major paths of inquiry. The first
concentrates on the history of educational ideas—in this case, universal edu-
cation and mass schooling. This analytical strategy, which dominated scholar-
ly discourse for years, surveys the writings of leading educational, religious,
and political thinkers who, at different times and places, championed the
spread of formal education to young children of different social and cultural
backgrounds in increasingly inclusionary terms. Based on the assumption
that key educational reforms resulted from the ideas and inspired leadership
of particular individuals or groups, this strategy typically focuses on the edu-
cation-related treatises of prominent scholars such as Bacon, Locke,
Montaigne, and Comenius, the intellectual legacies of Rousseau, Pestalozzi,
Froebel, Herbert, von Fellenburg, and later, Mann, Dewey, and Montessori,
and, owing to the early emergence of education in the Nordic countries
(Barnard, 1854: 619), sometimes considers the work of Lutheran preachers
such as Grundtvig and Kold.
Undoubtedly, the development of modern education in the West owes
much to the scholarly (and popular) writings of such leading educational fig-
ures. Nevertheless, once the ideas of modern education and mass schooling
took root and gained widespread acceptance, educational realities quickly
turned to practicalities, namely, establishing a legal basis for public schooling,
organizing a system of interconnected schools and authorized courses of
study, prescribing required curricular contents, setting up teacher training
frameworks, and defining the contours of educational governance and
finance. The actual decisions to establish and expand school systems were,
in our opinion, muchless influenced by the ideas of leading or “alternative”
(e.g., Tolstoy, Freire, or Illich) educational thinkers, and more by broad-
based political, economic, and social forces. Furthermore, even if one could
demonstrate the historical existence of substantive links between particular
thinkers and specific educational reforms or practices, we suspectthat these
have become increasingly tenuous over the course of the twentieth century
and beyond the geographical confines of Western Europe and North
America. Finally, given the objectives of this facet of the UBASE project—to
determine the extent to which variations in the history and evolution of mass
schooling are relevant to contemporary policy discussions and initiatives—
we believe that a comparative mapping of influential educational ideas of the
past would lead us down a well-trodden path into an analytical cul-de-sac.
A second path of inquiry involves the research literature on educational
expansion and formalization. This substantial body of historical and empiri-
cal research spans academic disciplines (e.g., economics, history, sociology,
political science), incorporates and often tests alternative theoretical explana-
tions (e.g., functionalism, convergence, reproduction, status competition,
population ecology), encompasses different levels of analysis (e.g., individu-
als, regions, states), and employs a range of research designs (e.g., historical
case studies, regional comparisons, and cross-national analyses) (see Meyer et
al., 1977; Craig, 1981; Archer, 1979; Heidenheimer, 1981; Boli et al., 1985;
Rubinson and Ralph, 1984; Benavot and Riddle, 1988; Fuller and Rubinson,
1992; Meyer et al., 1992; Jónasson, 2003; Clemens, 2004).The vast majority
of these studies investigate the antecedents of educational expansion. Many
fewer examine mass schooling in terms of legal formalization, administrative
(de)centralization, and school-home relations (for exceptions, see Boli-
Bennettand Meyer,1978; Muller et al., 1987; Inkeles and Sirowy,1983;
Ramirez and Ventresca, 1992; Cummings and Riddell, 1994; Green et al.,
1999; Astiz et al., 2002).
For the purposes of the present paper,this path of inquiryhas several
limitations (apart from having already been well surveyed). First, the over-
whelming focus on school expansion leads most researchers to consider a
narrow set of measures with respectto the development of modern education
systems.Comparative studies of mass schooling tend to disproportionately
emphasize school enrollment rates
3
and how they changed over time.
However instructive analyses of enrollment rates maybe, they should not be
the sole basis for deducing whicheconomic, social, demographic, cultural, or
institutional conditions were most conducive to the development of mass
schooling. Second, aggregate (usually national) estimates of past enrollment
rates hide important differences in access to formal schooling determined by
gender, ethnicity, religious affiliation, region, and locale (urban or rural)—
differences that have considerable policy relevance today. They also gloss over
important gaps between enrollment and attendance rates, which reveal inter-
esting patterns of family-school relations and parental (un)willingness to
comply with compulsory school laws. Third, educational data for the nine-
teenth century, especially prior to 1870, are often incomplete or nonexistent,
even though this period was among the most formative in the development
of mass schooling in Europe and the Americas. Fourth, many comparative
8
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
3. Enrollment rates measure the extent to which a pre-defined age group was enrolled in a
particular set of schools at a given educational level.
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
9
historical studies of schooling ignore key elements in the institutionalization
of public, secular mass school systems (e.g., legal formalization, administra-
tive centralization, grade sequencing, the linking of primary and post-primary
courses of study). Studies of these elements would provide a more variegated
and nuanced portrayal of historical and contemporary patterns of mass
schooling. Finally, if educational expansion is endemic, following fairly rigid
diffusion patterns as some have argued (Meyer et al., 1992; Clemens, 2004),
then such findings diminish the analytical space for the discussion of new or
alternative policy options.
In sum, taking into account the limitations of existing paths of scholarly
inquiry and given our interest in developing a strategy which is not only his-
torically informed, but also policy savvy, we have undertaken a third analytical
strategy. As previously discussed, this approach essentially involves two steps:
first, a delineation of analytical issues concerning the comparative institution-
alization of mass schooling; and second, an examination of their historical
emergence, including a description of the diverse meanings they embodied in
different contexts and a discussion of the patterns of their evolution.
LEGAL-INSTITUTIONAL CONDITIONS
Compulsory Schooling and its Prolongation
Compulsoryschool legislation represents both an important enabling condi-
tion and a significant political intention in national attempts to universalize
access to basic education. Whether by decree, proclamation, statute, law, or
constitutional provision, government authorities set forth a legal basis for the
establishment of systems of publicly funded, state-administered schools.
Historically,newly independent nation-states often enacted legal provisions
for compulsoryschooling as they sought to consolidate their authorityand
control over a given territoryand population. Many political leaders came to
view the building of a national system of public secular schools as a conscious
strategy to weaken the influence of religious institutions in local communities
and to empower the state in its pursuit of industrialization and national unity.
Bycompelling attendance in public secular schools, governments ensured
that young children would receive instruction in basic literacy and numeracy
as well as in “appropriate” (i.e., non-religious) moral precepts and political
principles.
Colonial administrations established compulsory school laws and educa-
tional ordinances in dependent colonies, sparsely populated territories, and
semi-autonomous regions even though, as was often the case, the resources
needed to provide school spaces for all school-age children were insufficient.
4
Although unrealistic in scope, the enactment of compulsory school rules
symbolized the importance and desirability of formalizing socialization
4. While the lack of implementation or enforcement of compulsory laws was not exclusive
to non-independent political entities, it was much more pervasive than in independent
countries.
frameworks for the young. In addition, they legitimated and bolstered efforts
by missionaries and other private groups to construct and expand school
buildings. Certainly, colonial policies supporting modern (in this case,
Western) schooling were one means of securing native support for other gov-
ernment policies. Overall, the passage of compulsory school laws evinced the
political intentions of public authorities, even if the laws were limited by
design and infeasible to realize. They also forged a social contract between
colonial administrations, religious groups, local communities, parents, and
children. Below, we discuss key issues regarding the establishment, substance,
and prolongation of compulsory schooling laws. We emphasize the lack of
uniformity concerning the intentions and design of compulsory enrollment
statutes throughout history, to say nothing of their actual impacts on the lives
and routines of families and school-age children.
The Timing and Passage of Compulsory School Legislation
Today, over 90 percent of the world’s countries have legally binding rules
requiring children’s school attendance (UNESCO,2002; Benavot, 2002). The
first suchlaws were enacted about 200 years ago in Prussia and Denmark
(Soysal and Strange, 1989).Prior to these first laws, however, proclamations
obligating parents to provide for the education of their children, not neces-
sarily in schools, circulated in various European and North American com-
munities such as Weimar,Massachusetts, Brunswick, and Gotha (Ramirez
and Boli, 1993).Nordic families wereurged by King and Churchaliketo edu-
cate their children in fundamental religious precepts, moral virtues, and the
rudiments of reading and writing.Suchproclamations—normative rather
than legally binding—underscored the pivotal roles that religious authorities
and families played in the early spread of literacyin Europe (Maynes, 1985;
Graff,1987; Mitch, 1992; Vincent, 2000).
The establishment of compulsorymass schooling is best understood as an
extended historical process, initially limited in geographical scope, in which
education of the young moved out of the home and churchand into the pub-
lic sphereof differentiated schools.Ramirez and Boli (1993) describe this
process as the institutionalization of Western models of socialization and pro-
pose three distinct stages of development. Compulsory education was a part of
the Reformation movement to enhance religious piety and individual faith
among Protestant families. It developed in the seventeenth century, mainly in
Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and certain German principalities and North
American colonies. Mass schooling was part of a movement to weaken family
socialization and home-based instruction by establishing community schools
with largely religious and fairly standardized curricula that emphasized the
development of literacy, biblical knowledge, and moral character. It emerged
in the eighteenth century, mainly in Norway, various Swiss cantons, Dutch
provinces, and German Länder.Lastly, compulsory mass schooling,in which the
nation-state became the central—if not the sole—initiator, guarantor, and
administrator of an inter-connected system of schools, emerged in nineteenth
century Europe and the Americas. Children of specified ages were legally
10
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
11
compelled to attend state-authorized schools for a stipulated number of days
and weeks each year.
Most scholarly research focuses on the third stage, analyzing historical
and comparative patterns in the development of compulsory mass schooling
(e.g., Soysal and Strange, 1989; Ramirez and Ventresca, 1992; Mangan, 1994;
Cummings, 2003). Historical case studies describe, in considerable detail,
political developments that influenced the establishment or revision of com-
pulsory education statutes in, for example, Thailand (Jumsai, 1951), Iraq
(Clark, 1951), the Philippines (Isidro et al., 1952), Indonesia (Hutasott, 1954),
South Korea (Central Education Research Institute, 1967), Prussia and
Austria (van Horn Melton, 1988), Bavaria (Schleunes, 1989), and the United
States (Glenn, 1988). Cross-national studies, on the other hand, analyze varia-
tions in the timing of compulsory schooling laws. For each country, a partic-
ular date is chosen to reflect either the creation of a national education system
(Soysal and Strange, 1989) or the intentions of a government or governing
body to require all children within defined age categories to attend school
(Ramirez and Ventresca, 1992). Despite slight differences in the exact years
used by researchers to designate the establishment of compulsory schooling
in eachcountry (and keeping in mind that laws and administrative rules were
often rescinded, re-instated, or revised), the following basic patterns can be
summarized:
•Several German states were the forerunners in passing compulsory educa-
tion laws, beginning in the eighteenth century and continuing through the
early nineteenth century.
•Almost all European countries—earlier in Western Europe, later in Eastern
Europe—enacted compulsory school laws during the nineteenth century
and the first three decades of the twentieth century.
•Although the United States never passed a federal law compelling school
enrollment, individual states made provisions for compulsory schooling in
state constitutions and/or legal statutes. Massachusetts passed its first com-
pulsory attendance law in 1852, followed by states in the Northeast,
Midwest, and the far West. In total, 33 states passed compulsory school
laws during the nineteenth century; 17 states, mainly from the South, did so
in the twentieth century. Interestingly, many western territories passed
compulsory attendance laws prior to achieving statehood, in anticipation of
subsequent settlement (Richardson, 1984; 1986).
•Most Southern and Central American countries passed compulsory school
statutes fairly early during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, although
the term free and compulsoryeducation was used “moreas utopian proj-
ects than as any reflection of reality” (Garcia Garrido, 1986: 19).
5
Indeed,
5. Exemplifying the recurrent proclamations regarding compulsory schooling in Latin
America, Garcia Garrido mentions the Paraguyan case: “Since independence in 1811, com-
pulsory primary education was decreed by Rodrigo de Francia in 1828, by Lopez in 1844,
by the Constitution of 1870, by the Law of 1887, by the Compulsory Education Law of
1909, by the subsequent law of 1924, by the Constitution of 1940 and, lastly, by the current
primary enrollment rates in the first half of the twentieth century were
much lower in Latin America than in Europe or North America (Benavot
and Riddle, 1988).
•About 80 percent of the 60 countries that were independent in 1945 had
enacted compulsory attendance laws.
•Between 1945 and 2004, 125 former colonies and non-self-governing terri-
tories became independent in Asia, Africa, Europe, and parts of the
Americas; 85 percent of these new states had passed compulsory school laws
by 2000. As in the case of the United States, a significant number of former
colonies had already passed educational ordinances that addressed pupil
attendance prior to achieving independence.
Beyond these descriptive patterns, the literature addresses several analyti-
cal issues. For example, comparative analyses discovered an interesting link
between the date of independence and the date at which compulsory school-
ing rules were enacted (Ramirez and Boli-Bennett, 1982). Based on informa-
tion for over 55 countries, it appears that the lag between these two dates
shortened in each successive wave of national independence. Whereas for
countries that became independent in the nineteenth century, the mean lag
period from independence until the passage of a compulsory schooling rule
was between 25 to 50 years, this lag was reduced to less than 6 years during
the first half of the twentieth century. Following World War II, newly inde-
pendent countries typically passed a compulsory education law within about
a year of becoming independent, although some countries, as previously
noted, have yet to do so. Ramirez and Boli argue that this pattern illustrates
that the ideology of compulsory education was not inherent in the formation
of nation states during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, but became
increasingly part of the nation-state model during the twentieth century. In
recent decades, compulsory education has become closely intertwined with
the array of activities undertaken by national governments. As Ramirez and
Boli note, “The link between the state and education is complete and taken
for granted” (1982: 29).
Other studies have examined the relationship between the extent of edu-
cational expansion and the timing of compulsory school legislation.
Comparative evidence in Europe (Soysal and Strange, 1989) and across
nations (Ramirez and Ventresca, 1992) indicates a weak association between
these two variables. In some cases (e.g., Prussia, Denmark, Sweden, Japan),
the adoption of compulsory school laws initiated a period of enrollment
expansion. In others, mainly in South America, laws supporting compulsory
education were enacted but rarely enforced. In the latter contexts, enrollment
rates in elementary schools were limited at the time of formal enactment and
remained relatively low throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth cen-
12
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
Constitution of 1967” (Garcia Garrido, 1986: 19). Although utopian proclamations in favor
of mass schooling were voiced and passed by political leaders, well beyond the boundaries
of the Americas, the disjuncturebetween the ideal and reality was apparently acute in Latin
American educational history.
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
13
turies. In still other cases (e.g., Swiss cantons, France, most U.S. states), sys-
tems of mass schooling were already well in place when compulsory school-
ing legislation was passed. Even today, several countries lacking compulsory
school laws (e.g., Singapore, Oman, Saudi Arabia) have achieved very high
enrollment rates. Overall, it appears that pressures on new states to pass com-
pulsory school laws following political independence have increased sharply
over time. These expectations are only indirectly related to the actual (and
future) expansion of a country’s education system. Their impact on other fea-
tures of educational modernization (e.g., teacher training, public financing of
education, the building of schools) remains under-studied.
6
Furthermore, historical evidence suggests that the political, social, and
institutional meanings associated with the establishment of compulsory
schooling varied significantly over time and place. In France, for example, the
passage of such laws reflected an ongoing struggle between the Catholic
Church and the state, while in Prussia and Scandinavian countries where the
state mobilized Protestant churches to create national churches, support for
mass schooling was ensured (Soysal and Strange, 1989; Schleunes, 1989). In
Japan, compulsoryeducation, long in gestation, owed much to comparisons
to industrial leaders suchas the United States and military competitors such
as China (Japanese National Commission for UNESCO,1958).In Ecuador,the
compulsory attendance law of 1871 was meant to overcome the lack of interest
in education among parents, on the one hand, and strongly rooted colonial
prejudices against girls’ schooling,on the other (Uzcategui, 1951).In depend-
ent Indian States (i.e., Baroda, Kolhapur,Mysore) and parts of British India,
the passage of compulsoryschool laws coincided with a “rising tide of
nationalist opinion” (Saiyidain et al., 1952: 21).In Sri Lanka, the legislation to
makeeducation free and compulsory was intended to reduce child labor in
coffee, rubber,and coconut plantations, and to create conditions for enroll-
ment expansion (Little, 1998).In many Arab states, compulsoryeducation
laws reflected initial attempts to redress long-standing gender disparities in
enrollment and attendance (UNESCO,1956a).In the western territories of the
United States, the passage of suchlaws anticipated actual settlement, crystal-
lizing a blueprint for future development (Richardson, 1986). In short,
although the establishment of compulsory school laws increasingly accompa-
nied nation-state formation, the meanings and intentions of such legal provi-
sions reflected diverse configurations of local political, economic, and cultur-
al conditions.
The historical record suggests that political authorities employed widely
different rationales to enact compulsory school laws. In some cases, the estab-
lishment of compulsory education addressed narrowly defined educational
problems; in others, it was employed as a strategy to “solve” or defer solving
6. Astate’s commitment to educational expansion should be examined through measures
beyond the passage of compulsory school legislation, important as this legislation may be.
The public financing of building schools, the percentage of a nation’s domestic product
allocated to education, and other indicators of state investment in mass schooling may be
better predictors of subsequent educational expansion.
long-standing economic, cultural, or social problems. In India, for example,
the impact of several early initiatives towards compulsory education under
British rule remained highly localized, even after the country became inde-
pendent. According to Weiner (1991: 4–5), the Indian state was unable, or
unwilling, to deal with pervasive low school enrollments and endemic child
labor. He argues that this was not due to the country’s precarious economic
situation, but rather to deeply rooted beliefs among the Indian middle class
about social order and hierarchy, the importance of education in reinforcing
social class distinctions, and “concerns that ‘excessive’ and ‘inappropriate’
education for the poor would disrupt social arrangements” (Weiner, 1991: 5).
The Particularities of Compulsory School Laws
Below, we briefly discuss the contents of select compulsory attendance laws,
with the aim of exposing forgotten, yet potentially interesting, historical par-
ticularities. We first examine the compulsory school ordinances passed in the
Northwest Territories ceded to the Dominion of Canada by the Hudson Bay
Trading Company in 1870. Settled in far flung trading posts, peopled by
diverse populations of Indians, whites, and Métis, and served by religious
missionaries representing Catholic, Methodist, and Anglican churches, the
huge expanses of the Northwest Territories had little to speak of in the way of
mass schooling (Kach and Mazurek, 1993). Nevertheless, during the last
quarter of the nineteenth century,several compulsoryeducation ordinances
wereenacted. In 1875, the earliest ordinance devised an initial blueprint for
school expansion that, in effect, disenfranchised foreign immigrants and
Native Americans and set forth demanding preconditions for the creation of
schools.Subsequent ordinances, whichsought to provide a stronger basis for
school expansion, established school districts and separate school boards for
Protestants and Catholics, eachof whom was responsible for teacher certifi-
cation, curricular guidelines, and school inspections.The ordinance of 1892
abolished the emergent framework of schools controlled by religious authori-
ties in favor of a system of publicly supported and administrated schools.
Though this ordinance best exemplifies a modern, inclusionarylegal statute
for mass compulsory schooling, it carried important caveats in its rich details:
•“In every School District, where there are at least fifteen children of School
age, resident within a radius of one mile and a half from the School House,
it shall be compulsory for the Trustees of such District to keep the school
open all year (section 186).
•“In everySchool District, where there are at least ten children of School
age, it shall be compulsoryfor the Trustees of such District to leave their
school in operation at least six months in every year (187).
•“Every parent, guardian or other person, resident in School District having
control of any child or children, between ages seven and twelve years, shall
be required to send such child or children to School for a period of at least
twelve weeks in each year...(188).
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GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
15
•“It shall be the duty of the Trustees of every School District...after being
notified that any parent or guardian...neglects or violates the provisions of
the above section, to make complaint of such neglect to a Justice of the
Peace...(189).
•“It shall be the duty of the Justice of the Peace to ascertain...the circum-
stances of any party complained of for not sending his or her child to
School...and he shall accept any of the following as a reasonable excuse:
1. That the child is under instruction in some other satisfactory manner;
2. That the child has been prevented from attending School by sickness or
any unavoidable cause;
3. That there is no School open...not exceeding two and one half miles,
measured according to the nearest passable road from the residence of
the child;
4. That such a child has reached a standard of education of the same or of
agreater degree than that attained in the School of the School District
within which such child resides (190).”
7
These statutes are noteworthy in many respects. First and foremost, they
formalized a web of social and institutional relationships between local com-
munities, political bodies, elected officials, educational authorities, the legal
system, and, naturally, parents, teachers, and children. For example, the
establishment of compulsory schooling compelled action from multiple par-
ties: the trustees of each school district were required to build, maintain, and
operate schools; parents and guardians were required to send all their 7–12
year old children to school (barring officially recognized mitigating circum-
stances); school officials and community members were asked to report non-
compliant parents; and judges were responsible for determining the reasons
for, and consequences of, non-attendance. Second, the 1892 ordinance high-
lights the many contingencies associated with compulsory schooling. The
establishment of schools depended on local population concentrations and
age distributions; the length of the school term depended on the size of the
school-age population; parental obligations were contingent on residential
location (in relation to schools) and the provision of alternative educational
opportunities at home. Third, these statutes underscore inequalities in school
provisions—note the varying length of the school year and school session by
district. Fourth, these statutes illustrate that compulsory education was not
just a circumscribed relationship between the state (or territorial authority)
and families with children, but an issue in which the wider community had a
stake, for example, in ensuring parental compliance. Lastly and significantly,
legislators who passed these statutes clearly acknowledged alternative avenues
of educational provision, through home based instruction, private tutoring,
or “some other satisfactorymanner.”Given the geographical and climatic
7.Ordinance of Northwest Territories, 1892, An Ordinance to Amend and Consolidate as
Amended the Ordinance Respecting Schools, sections 186-190, quoted in Kach and
Mazurek (1993: 170ff).
realities of northern Canadian communities, the importance (and perhaps the
practical necessity) of home-based instruction is understandable.
A realistic approach to free and compulsory education, one that acknowl-
edges the widely diverse material and cultural conditions of the communities
to be covered by educational statutes, was also apparent in the 1950s, when
newly independent nations began passing and implementing compulsory
school legislation. In Pakistan, for example, authorities encouraged different
provinces to develop their own multi-year schemes to establish compulsory
education in gradual stages, taking into account historical ordinances as well
as the actual distribution of school facilities, classrooms, qualified teachers,
attendance patterns, and the possibility of regular supervision and enforce-
ment (Huq, 1954). Burma and Cambodia employed pilot projects and provi-
sional solutions, especially in relation to existing religious and private
schools, as a mechanism for enlarging the scope and coverage of compulsory
education (UNESCO,1954). Owing to harsh economic conditions and limited
public budgets, many countries introduced special measures to help fund and
maintain primary schools—for example, village-based financing (Laos), or
obligatoryparental contributions to school budgets in the form of cash,
material, or labor (Philippines).To encourage parents to send their children
to school, and to improve the well being of enrolled pupils, primary schools
in Mauritius provided free milk and yeast each day to pupils (UNESCO,1954:
68).Additional strategies intended to boost public support for compulsory
education and to increase regular pupil attendance included curricular
reforms in public schools, changes in languages of instruction, and teacher
involvement in communitylife.
Nevertheless, public authorities knew they werefighting a protracted,
uphill battle to institutionalize mass schooling and compel attendance. As a
result, early compulsoryattendance statutes included many categories of
exemptions based on conditions suchas geographical location, physical and
mental disabilities of children or parents, access to home instruction, agricul-
tural cycles, and household povertylevels.
In short, though therearefew instances of newly independent countries
having directly opposed the basic principle of free and compulsory schooling,
political leaders openly acknowledged that material and cultural conditions in
their countries made it virtually impossible to implement this principle in
practice. A close examination of the contents of compulsory school legislation
illustrates the degree to which diverse social realities were acknowledged and
considered, even as the principle was being institutionalized and as political
leaders envisioned the development of elaborate public school systems.
International Organizations’ Impacts on Compulsory Education in Newly
Independent Countries
On December 10, 1948, the United Nations adopted the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). Article 26 of the Declaration stated
emphatically: “Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free,
at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall
16
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
17
be compulsory....”
8
Signatories of the UDHR committed themselves to the
goal of providing school places for all children and were expected to imple-
ment legislation making schooling compulsory. By compelling attendance in
school, political authorities sought to enable each child to exercise his or her
right to education. Depending on the nature of educational provisions, gov-
ernments were under considerable international pressure to either stipulate
the minimum duration of school attendance and the age groups to be
enrolled or to establish laws prolonging the duration of compulsory school-
ing. Where compulsory education was well established and included primary
education, the extension of the school-leaving age into post-primary or sec-
ondary education was expected. Where only part of the primary cycle was
mandatory, compulsory education was to be prolonged to include the full
length of the primary cycle. Where no compulsory school laws existed, there
was pressure to pass such laws and, in doing so, to expand access to primary
education.
The positions and declarations adopted by member states attending
regional UNESCO conferences on Free and Compulsory Education in the
1950s (Bombay1952, Cairo1955, Lima 1956) reflected the results of this inter-
national pressure. The Bombay conference recommended compulsory educa-
tion for no less than seven years, whereas the Cairo and Lima conferences
recommended compulsoryeducation for a minimum of six years. (In Latin
America, it was understood that this did not necessarily apply to rural areas,
wherethe duration was often only three years.) All regional conferences rec-
ognized the legal obligation of states to expand provisions for primary educa-
tion—compulsory attendance was unrealistic unless schools were available
and essentially free (i.e., no tuition, although fees for school books were
allowed). Even when the financial means to provide school spaces for all
school-age children were insufficient, governments enacted compulsory
school laws to crystallize their commitment to free and universal education.
8. When the term fundamental education was used in the UDHR,it meant the right to edu-
cation for illiterate adults and others who were denied the opportunity to receive a full ele-
mentary education during their youth. The term was first used by the Preparatory
Commission of UNESCO in preparing documents for UNESCO’s1st General Conference
held in November 1946. Despite some uncertainty over the term, there was considerable
consensus that fundamental education meant an education that would provide for the
acquisition of literacyand other essential knowledge, including skills and values needed to
fully participate in society (UNESCO,2000). The definition of fundamental education is
very similar to today’s concept of basic education. The main difference is that the former
term emphasizes the immediate needs of community while the later term conceives of edu-
cation as preparation for life-long learning.In operational terms, fundamental education
was mainly understood as community education (e.g., adult literacy programs, agricultural
and health education). Fundamental education and adult education were considered two
aspects of the French term: popular education. In the early 1960s, especially with the inde-
pendence of former colonies, international focus on adult education—a more established
term among UN member states—widened to include literacy and the learning needs of
adults who had not received any formal education during childhood. In general, attention
shifted away from fundamental education and emphasis on the eradication of illiteracy
increased.
In short, although quite a few former colonies had passed limited educational
ordinances prior to independence (e.g., India, Philippines, Iraq, Malaya),
there is little doubt that international organizations played a leading role in
the passage of compulsory attendance legislation in newly independent states.
The Prolongation of Compulsory Education
In the 1950s, international policy discussions on compulsory schooling typi-
cally revolved around the establishment of an inclusive law that defined the
minimum number of years that children would be required to attend school
and, when possible, the extension of this period. In practice, this meant that
countries were encouraged to define two age boundaries: first, the entry age,
when parents were expected to enroll their children in school; and second,
the minimum exit age, when children could leave school and either remain at
home or enter the labor market.
Interestingly, few comparative historical studies have examined the social,
political, and economic forces affecting changes in the duration (as distinct
from the timing) of compulsory schooling. Nevertheless, initial evidence sug-
gests that different sets of factors affected long-term changes in the age
boundaries of compulsoryeducation. On the one hand, the entrance age
boundarybecame more fixed over time. To the degree that evolving concep-
tions of childhood and child development, women’s labor force participation,
and the availabilityof certified teachers influenced this boundary,compulsory
education incorporated younger and younger children. On the other hand,
the exit age changed morefrequently (to include older and older youth) and
was moreinfluenced by the passage of child labor laws, the demand for youth
labor, changing norms regarding marriage and family formation, the expan-
sion of secondaryschooling,and budgetaryconstraints.
In 1927,the International Labour Office asked the International Bureau
of Education (IBE)to carryout an international survey of the duration of
compulsoryschooling,to inform new policies for raising the school-leaving
age (IBE,1932).Table 1 compares the results from this survey with present-day
figures on the duration of compulsoryschooling for over 42 education sys-
tems. During the 70-year interval between 1930 and 2000, the vast majority
of education systems (68 percent) made no change to the entrance age of
compulsory schooling. By contrast, 85 percent of systems raised the exit age
of compulsory education, usually by 1 or 2 years, but in some cases by 3 or 4
years. In addition, it can be assumed that for many countries in the 1930s,
especially in Eastern Europe, Latin America, and Asia, laws stipulating the
entrance and exit ages of compulsory schooling reflected intentions more
than realities, with few enforcement mechanisms in place. Today, even in
cases when the age parameters of compulsory schooling have changed little
since 1930, the disjuncture between legal statutes and educational realities has
been significantly reduced. Finally, the systems compared in Table 1 show a
certain degree of institutional convergence. Over time, cross-national varia-
tion in the entrance and exit ages of compulsory education has been reduced.
18
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
19
Table 1: Long-term Trends in the Age Boundaries of Compulsory Schooling, 1930–2000
Country Ages entering and leaving
compulsory schooling, circa 1930
Ages entering and leaving
compulsory schooling, circa 2000
Austria 6–14 6–15
Belgium 6–14 6–18
Denmark 7–14 7–16
England 5–14 5–16
Finland 7–15 7–16
France 6–13 6–16
Greece 6–12 6–15
Iceland 7–14 (towns)/10–14 (country) 6–16
Ireland 6–14 6–15
Italy 6–12 6–15
Luxembourg 7–14 6–15
Netherlands 6–13 6–17
New Zealand 7–14 6–16
Norway 7–14 6–16
Portugal 7–11 6–15
Spain 6–14 6–16
Sweden 7–14 7–16
Albania 6–12 6–14
Bulgaria 7–14 7–15
Czechoslovakia/Czech Rep. 6–14 6–15
Estonia 8–16 7–15
Hungary 6–15 7–16
Latvia 7–14 7–15
Lithuania 7–12 7–16
Poland 7–14 7–18
Romania 5–14 7–16
USSR/ Russian Federation 8–15 6–15
Argentina 6–14 6–15
Brazil 7–14 7–14
Costa Rica 7–14 6–15
Ecuador 6–14 6–14
Guatemala 7–14 6–15
Haiti 6–14 6–15
Mexico 6–14 6–15
Paraguay 7–14 6–14
Uruguay 6–14 6–15
China 6–14 6–14
Egypt Not compulsory 6–14
India 6–11 6–14
Japan 6–14 6–15
Tunisia Not compulsory 6–16
Turkey 7–12 6–14
Sources: Bulletin of the International Bureau of Education (1932) 23 (2): 51–53; and Table
4in UNESCO-EFA Global Monitoring Report (2003/4) Gender and Education for All.Paris:
UNESCO.
Analyses of contemporary patterns of compulsory schooling, involving a
greater number of national education systems, reveal several interesting pat-
terns. First, among the 90 percent of countries having passed compulsory
attendance laws, considerable variation is apparent in the duration of com-
pulsory schooling. In some countries, pupils are expected to attend school for
only 4–5 years (e.g., São Tomé, Equatorial Guinea, Bangladesh, Nepal,
Vietnam, Iran), while other countries compel attendance for as long as 12–13
years (e.g., Netherlands, Saint Kitts, Germany, Belgium, Brunei). Second,
there appears to be a fairly strong association between a country’s income
level and the duration of compulsory education (Benavot, 2002). Third, in
recent decades, the mean duration of compulsory schooling (which typically
begins at age 5 or 6) has increased by a full year, from a global average of 7.2
years (86 countries) in 1965 to 8.2 years (169 countries) in 2000. During this
period, European and North American countries mandated, on average,
between 8 to 10 years of compulsory education. In other regions, the mean
duration was as follows: 8.3 years in Latin America and the Caribbean, 7.9
years in the Middle East and North Africa, 7.8 years in Asia and the Pacific,
and 7.2 years in sub-Saharan Africa. In all world regions, except Sub-Saharan
Africa, the trend over time has been to prolong compulsory schooling. In
Sub-Saharan Africa, by contrast, there has been a decline in the mean dura-
tion of compulsory education, especially since 1995, reflecting the inability of
countries in this region to mobilize the necessaryfinancial resources to pay
for,and enforce, 7 or 8 years of compulsoryschooling.
Conclusion
Although discussions of compulsoryschooling todayareoverwhelmingly
taken for granted, the establishment of compulsorymass schooling involved
different logics, interests, and approaches.When former colonies established
alegal framework for compulsoryattendance following independence, they
drew upon different historical experiences and rationales.Typically, the politi-
cal authorities in newly independent nations moved quickly to adopt the
legal and ideological garb of compulsoryeducation. The laws they passed
were not only rich in content, but also full of qualifications and exemptions.
In retrospect, they reveal the rather realistic and sanguine approach of sup-
porters of compulsory mass schooling to the implementation process and its
chances for success. These supporters explicitly built many accommodations
and contingencies into the process, which was to be carried out over a pro-
longed period. These historical realities should be revisited as discussions
turn to contemporary strategies to achieve universal basic education.
SYSTEMIZATION PROCESSES
The Formation of National School Systems
A distinctive feature of modern education is its systemic character. From an
analytical perspective, the transformation of disparate educational frame-
20
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
21
works into an organized, interconnected system involved at least two
processes: the formation of a national system of schools and the standardiza-
tion of educational forms. In Europe, the creation of national education sys-
tems entailed a drawn-out process whereby most—if not all—types of educa-
tion were placed under one umbrella and administered through an integrated
state bureaucracy. This process parallels the “unification” of a state education
system, as discussed by Archer (1979: 174): “…the incorporation or develop-
ment of diverse establishments, activities and personnel under a central
national and specifically educational framework of administration.” In such
systems, government authorities, typically located in a central ministry, over-
saw all state-regulated schools through the licensing and inspection of school
institutions, the recruitment, training, and certification of teachers, the deter-
mination of curricular contents, and the development of nationally recog-
nized qualifications. Thus, the extent of centralization in educational gover-
nance is a key analytical feature of the formation of national education
systems.
In addition, various processes of standardization accompanied the growth
of national school systems.Schools at different educational levels—pre-pri-
mary,primary, secondary, and higher education—were classified into stan-
dard, hierarchical categories. Increased standardization of curricula, examina-
tions, and certification enabled the articulation and coordination of different
educational levels.The actual level of standardization depended, to a large
extent, on the extent of centralization within the educational system.
Nevertheless, far from being the outcome of innocuous bureaucratic deci-
sions and directives, standardization often touched upon salient social, cul-
tural, and political tensions.Among other things, authorities had to deter-
mine the status of religious schools as well as the role of private or voluntary
associations in educational affairs.Thus, the formation of national education
systems created at least two difficult dilemmas for state administrators, one
dealing with the relationship between religious and secular education, and
the other involving the relationship between public and private education.
Although the two dilemmas areinterrelated (most private schools werealso
religious ones), for the purpose of clear analysis, we prefer to deal with them
separately. The public versus private dilemma stresses the role and authority
of the state in the finance, governance, and regulation of education, while the
religious versus secular dilemma focuses on the conflict over worldviews and
values (Western, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, etc.).
We characterize early models of national education systems and address
three core dilemmas that have accompanied systemization in the past: 1) the
extent of centralization or decentralization in educational governance; 2) the
tension between public schools and private schools; and 3) the tension
between religious education and secular education.
Early Models of National Education Systems
The first major national education systems in Europe—Prussian and
French—included an expanding framework of secular public schools based
on compulsory school laws and a strong state administrative apparatus.
9
These distinctive features have defined the foundations of many education
systems throughout the world ever since. In addition, the education systems
of England, the United States, the Soviet Union, and Japan constituted basic
models that influenced educational systemization in different world regions.
Below we briefly describe these early national education systems.
In Prussia,under King Frederick II (1740–1786), the state came to assume
an active and expansive role in the mobilization of society for economic, tech-
nical, and scientific progress. This involved the establishment of state-author-
ized schools, the development of a common state-mandated curriculum, and
the creation of an administrative structure to oversee and inspect state-financed
schools. The 1794 General Code specified the details of this system and repre-
sented a move towards both systemization and the affirmation of the state as
the central authority responsible for national education (Maynes, 1985;
Cummings, 1997). By the 1830s, Prussia had built an extensive national net-
work of public elementary schools, providing education for most children
until the age of 14,as well as an elaborate system of elite secondaryschools.
As public institutions, schools wereauthorized and inspected by the state,
teachers were trained and licensed by the state, and the curriculum was devel-
oped by state officials and regulated by national examinations (Green, 1990: 3).
Whereas the creation of the Prussian education system was an integral
part of the state formation process, in France, the state was already well con-
solidated and, as early as the seventeenth century, a central state apparatus
had emerged. This extremely centralized administration was the foundation
for the education system created by Napoleon, who placed schools under the
authorityof a central university, regional academies, departments, and local
communes. The early systemization of education in France owed much to the
power and authority of this centralized royal bureaucracy, even though the
emphasis was on elite educational institutions in the form of lycées and
grandes écoles (Durkheim, 1977). Popular education, by contrast, was limited
and largely under the auspices of the Catholic Church. The creation and
incorporation of elementary schools into the French education system
occurred only after the Revolution. In 1833, François Guizot established a
national system of basic education following the model shaped in the
Napoleonic era. Loi Guizot (the Guizot Law) extended state control over
teacher licensing and school inspection, and attempted to expand primary
schooling to each of the French communes. Only with the Ferry law in 1882,
however,did elementary education become free and compulsory in France
(Ringer,1979; Garnier, Hage, and Fuller, 1989; Cummings, 1997).
These early national education systems can be understood as conscious
strategies to address three critical needs in nascent states: 1) the need to shape
citizens’ loyalty through the inculcation of ideologies of nationhood, 2) the
22
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
9. The educational reform in Piedmont (Italy) in 1729 is considered by many as the first
attempt to build a state education system in Europe. We prefer to focus on the Prussian
and French cases because of their formative influences on later education systems.
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
23
need to provide the state with trained public administrators and military per-
sonnel, and 3) the need to mobilize society for economic purposes and indus-
trial development.
In Prussia, expanding public schooling served to consolidate a nation,
create a public administration, and further economic development. In
France, the systemization of education not only aimed to address these pur-
poses, but also to undermine the power of the Catholic Church and enhance
citizens’ loyalty to the state. Both the Prussian and French models of system-
ization were extremely influential in other parts of Europe and in South
America and were adapted in different ways in nascent state structures by
dominant social classes (Green, 1990: 4).
The creation of a national education system in England was late in
coming (almost 100 years after France and Prussia), despite extensive indus-
trialization. Political factors, especially the decentralized nature of the
English state, accounted in part for the absence of mass compulsory school-
ing and the late timing of educational systemization (Green, 1990: 309). In
contrast to continental Europe, political transformations in England brought
an end to absolutism by the seventeenth century.During the subsequent two
centuries, England established a relatively stable ruling class and experienced
few external militarythreats, social revolutions, or problems related to eco-
nomic backwardness similar to those faced by elites on the continent (Green,
1990: 312).Thus, nation building and economic development werenot the
main driving forces for the creation of a national education system in
England.
Many members of the English elite feared that educating the commoner
would contribute to political malcontent and revolutionaryoutbursts as had
occurred in France, and preferred the spread of elitist “public” schools, which
aimed at nurturing knowledgeable and refined gentlemen. Other segments of
the elite sought to broaden notions of citizenship,including political enfran-
chisement, and viewed the education of the masses as a focal point for their
reform efforts.During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the
enactment of a series of legal provisions increased the educational responsi-
bilities of the central state as well as local governments. These changes led to
the creation of new educational institutions serving the children of common
English citizens, effectively supplementing existing institutions that had long
served the offspring of political and economic elites. Nevertheless, the
English education system, which was based on deeply rooted principles of
charity and local initiative, was not nearly as well coordinated and integrated
as continental education systems (Green, 1990: 310–11).
One important motivating factor in the establishment of education sys-
tems in Europe was the incorporation of distinct ethnic and cultural groups
within an integrated national territory. This often meant the imposition of a
national language and a dominant culture with which the ruling elite identi-
fied (Bendix, 1969; Breuilly, 1982; Gellner, 1983; P. Anderson, 1991). Elites
often banned or restricted local languages and dialects in order to create
national “imagined communities” (B. Anderson, 1983). In France, the move
24
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
to linguistic homogenization succeeded in eliminating dialects such as Breton
and Patois; in Spain, however, this initiative made few inroads with the
Catalan and Basque languages, which were later revived and bolstered.
Homogenization weakened many local and ethnic traditions, but these tradi-
tions continued to act as a source of social and economic inequalities, espe-
cially in relation to educational opportunities. Citizens belonging to cultural
groups or geographical regions in which the official language was not com-
pletely rooted remained at a disadvantage.
In the United States, individual states, rather than the federal govern-
ment, had sovereign power over education. No national education system
developed, although certain federal regulations required territories to make
educational provisions as a condition of entry into the Union (Tyack, 1976).
Between 1830 and 1870, northern states developed systems of public schools,
financed from public sources and administered by state and county boards of
education (Green, 1990). The moral “crusade” of the common-school move-
ment during this period, suffused with religious and ideological themes,
resulted in the very high enrollments of young children in community-built
and publicly funded schools (Tyack, James, and Benavot, 1987). In fact, out-
side of the South, school enrollment rates were actually higher in predomi-
nantly rural and agricultural states than in more urban ones (Meyer et al.,
1979; Walters and O’Connell, 1988; Baker, 1999). As the government planned
and established settlements in the Western territories, they sold or rented
public lands in order to raise funds for the building of local schools
(Richardson, 1986).Overall, despite the lackof a centralized bureaucracy, the
educational structures created in United States, based on mass compulsory
schooling and extensive public spending,approximated a national education
system (Green, 1990).
In the Soviet Union, the creation and expansion of a national education
system emerged out of the Bolshevik Revolution (Matthews, 1982). Key prin-
ciples of Soviet education, established in 1918, continued to influence educa-
tional patterns until the breakup of the Soviet Union. In particular,Soviet
authorities developed mass educational institutions to improve literacylevels,
enhance meritocratic principles, and pursue industrial development
(Cummings, 2003: 27–29). The structure of Soviet education followed highly
rational, hierarchical, and bureaucratic lines of authority, which extended from
the central ministry through various regional and district levels until they
reached school directors, classroom teachers, and pupils. As part of an explicit
strategy of national development, the education system expanded to support
collective state objectives. Given these ideological concerns, the state fully sub-
sidized education and public authorities prepared detailed plans for human
resource development and manpower utilization. Central planning, which
accentuated the needs of the national economy and the state above those of
individual pupils, permeated the system (Grant, 1979; Whittacer, 1991; Eklof
and Dneprov, 1993). The Soviet model strongly influenced the education sys-
tems of Communist block countries, many of which adopted substantial fea-
tures of Soviet ideology and practice. Other communist countries (Cuba,
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
25
Vietnam, and China) also borrowed heavily from the Soviet model (Noah,
1986), even though the Soviet presence itself was less pervasive.
In Japan, following the abolition of feudalism and the Meiji Revolution
of 1868, educational reform was a key element in the reorganization of
national institutions and the creation of a central bureaucracy. The Meiji lead-
ers sought to use education as a means of enhancing national solidarity, train-
ing a technically competent labor force, and developing a more future-orient-
ed elite (Cummings, 1980; Westney, 1987; Shimahara, 1979). Several statutes
issued during the last decades of the nineteenth century resulted in the con-
solidation of existing elementary schools, which included ordinary, girls’,
village, paupers’, private, and infants’ schools. They also created a centralized
educational administration, a national system for the production of text-
books, and uniform finance and personnel policies (Japanese National
Commission for UNESCO,1958). As a consequence, the new regulations
appreciably reduced inter- and intra-regional differences in per student
expenditures in public schools. This centralized approach brought about con-
siderable uniformity in resource allocation and administrative procedures
(Cummings, 1980).
In the cases of the Soviet Union, Japan, and China (Hawkins, 1974), the
creation of a national education system resulted from major political transfor-
mations and the rupturing of ancient regimes. The centralized and hierarchi-
cal organization of the newly constituted education systems reflected the
basic governmental structures that emerged in the wakeof these social revo-
lutions (i.e., highly centralized, strong bureaucracies).
National Education Systems in Postcolonial States
Newly independent countries, with different histories of colonial rule and
economic dependence, built systems of schooling that werefundamentally
shaped by powerful external and internal political processes (Clignet and
Foster,1964; King,1990; Carnoy and Samoff,1990).Governments in the
West typically used the formation of national education systems to further
state consolidation, economic improvement, and nation building. Post-
colonial states faced additional challenges, including the legacies of colonial
education, the transformation of uneven and highly dependent economies,
and the creation of national political identities from disparate ethnic affinities
brought together under colonial partitions (Altbach and Kelly, 1984).
The education systems established in Africa and Asia struggled with
English, French, Portuguese, German, and Dutch colonial legacies that lasted
well into the twentieth century. Latin American states, best viewed as “old”
dependencies in relation to the new states of Africa and Asia, also confronted
patterns of educational stagnation (with the exception of Argentina).
European colonialism may have created a relatively educated, even moderniz-
ing, elite, but it also bequeathed weak and uneven infrastructures for the
development of mass education (Coleman, 1965). Scholars have commented
on the diminished influence of Portugal on education in its colonies. During
colonial times, the English-speaking world had a pervasive influence on the
26
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
Portuguese colony of Mozambique; until the mid-1920s, Protestant mission
schools outnumbered Catholic ones in Mozambique (Nóvoa et al., 2002),
and the former were seen as endangering Portuguese colonial authority
(Cross, 1987). As early as the 1930s, Brazil had already detached itself from
Portugal and did not consider the imperial power a point of reference in edu-
cational matters (Nóvoa et al., 2002).
Following independence,government authorities in many African and
Asian countries expanded education as a means of facilitating national soli-
darity and economic development. Inspired by socialist and egalitarian ideals,
and seeking to harness the widespread support of populist independence
movements, national leaders and intellectuals envisioned optimistic scenarios
that linked educational expansion with national development ingrained in
African values (Makulu, 1971: 34). These progressive ideals, however, encoun-
tered colonial legacies in which the educational philosophy and structures of
European countries had been uncritically transferred to their colonies
(Coleman, 1965: 37). The transfer of educational models was even reinforced
by the factthat local elites would continue to get their education in Europe.
Foreign languages of instruction, imported cultural values, and elite-oriented
schools rooted in colonial policies conditioned subsequent developments in
the newly formed national education systems.
Religious organizations and colonial administrations had not only created
schools with strong exogenous orientations, they had also actively hindered
the activities of indigenous educational institutions.Many traditional educa-
tional frameworks experienced severedislocation, as they wereunable to
compete with the programs and positions offered by mission schools and
colonial authorities.Others weredismantled or “eliminated” when colonial
authorities suspected them of inculcating nationalism or fomenting rebellion
(Carnoy,1974; Di Bona, 1981)
Although the educational legacies of European colonialism werefar reach-
ing,many scholars in postcolonial states have moved beyond blaming current
conditions of educational malaise on past colonial policies. For example,
Gauhar (1981: 64) contends that the “deplorable” state of education in many
African countries is the responsibility of their own leaders; many children are
deprived access to schools, sharpening ethnic divisions, and others become
alienated from native values and worldviews. Khan (1981: 17–21) claims that
the basic nature of formal education in Muslim areas has changed little since
independence, apart from its quantitative expansion. In the long shadow of
unmet targets to achieve free and universal education, enrollment rates in pri-
mary education have increased slowly, whereas secondary and higher educa-
tion enrollments have increased more quickly. Eager to ensure their children’s
mobility, elite groups pressured governments to increase access to secondary
and higher education, even though teaching standards and student academic
expectations in such institutions were often poor.
Nation building was a critical concern of the Latin American education
systems created in the aftermath of independence. The ideology of construct-
ing a nation reflected a shift from an exclusionary policy in colonial times to a
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
27
more inclusionary one after statehood (Rama, 1983: 15–16). Spanish and
Portuguese authorities secured their domination in part by excluding the
descendants of the conquered race from cultural resources and valued knowl-
edge. By ensuring the continued illiteracy of indigenous peoples in the language
used for official and market transactions, authorities maintained political con-
trol over “the broad masses of the socially inferior.” Colonial educational poli-
cies focused primarily on strengthening the elite Latin American universities,
which typically emphasized legal and theological training.
After independence, education was viewed as a means of enhancing polit-
ical participation and was used as a prerequisite for citizenship (e.g., illiterates
were disqualified from voting). Expanding educational opportunity reflected
the “sacred responsibility of governments to educate the sovereign for the full
exercise of his rights,” and education was, in theory, accessible for all (Rama,
1983: 17). Notwithstanding this modern participatory discourse, educational
developments on the ground remained stagnant. A highly unequal supply of
schools clearly favored the urban proletariat over the rural masses. Despite
the relatively high esteem accorded to education, demand varied greatly
among social groups.This can be explained partly by the underdevelopment
of democratic institutions in Latin America (Gale, 1969: 105).
Rama (1983) suggests that three interrelated elements—state action, edu-
cational demand, and the degree of educational differentiation—evolved into
alimited number of coreeducational models in Latin America. When restric-
tive state policies werecombined with a demand for education among the
upper classes and a fraction of the middle class, then an exclusive model
emerged. When the upper and middle classes came to predominate, and were
confronted with state policies favoring integration, then a segmentary model
resulted. When the middle classes and popular classes joined to demand edu-
cation, but the state, representing the dominant groups, restricted participa-
tion and limited aspirations for social mobility,then a classist model emerged.
And finally,when the middle class and popular classes joined together and
called on the state to increase educational opportunities to alleviate social
inequalities, then a universalist model resulted. Variations of these models
have featured prominently in the development of Latin American education
systems.
Among Latin American states, a sense of national unity took centuries to
create. And yet, this national unity has left many minority cultures completely
marginalized, especially groups such as the Quechua and Araya-speaking
Indians in the altiplano of Bolivia, the Incas of Peru, and indigenous peoples
in Mexico (Chiapas), Colombia, and Ecuador.
Nation building and national solidarity were prime objectives for educa-
tional expansion in Southeast Asia (e.g., Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia,
Philippines, and Thailand). Owing to strong regional loyalties and a plurality
of ethnic groups, issues of social integration and national unity were critical
concerns. In addition, colonial educational legacies in this region (with the
exception of independent Siam) differed significantly from other regions. To
begin with, most countries in southeastern Asia had centuries-old education-
28
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
al traditions. Special pagoda schools existed in Buddhist monasteries. In
Hindu areas, the padepokan served not only as a meeting place for villagers,
but also as a center of learning and religious instruction. Later, with the
introduction of Islam, young Muslim boys in Indonesia and Malaysia
acquired simple literacy skills in the pesantren,surau,or Qur’anic classes. In
other settings, temple priests became the main instructors in small village
schools. Christian missionaries, who arrived in the region with the influx of
European traders, established mission schools that provided rudimentary
education to some children. Moreover, colonial education policies in the
region, especially in the British colonies, followed a laissez-faire policy, allow-
ing different ethnic groups to develop separate educational institutions. In
Malaysia, for instance, there were Malay, Chinese, and Tamil vernacular
schools, as well as English medium schools, which were run mainly by
Christian missions (Wong, 1973: 129–39).
Finally, following independence, many states in this region actively
sought ways to integrate the diverse array of preexisting schools into their
emergent national education systems. Instead of closing or prohibiting reli-
gious schools, including missionaryones, new governments employed differ-
ent strategies to adapt them to national purposes.In Burma, for instance,
three systems of education were melded into one uniform system following
independence. In Malaysia, government policies towards school curricula
became a means of integrating diverse schools into a moreuniform education
system (Wong,1973).The Malaysian government ended separate vernacular
schools (Chinese, Tamil, etc.)and replaced them with a single type of primary
school. English medium schools remained open, although the government
instructed these schools to reorganize their curricula with a stronger empha-
sis on Malaysian content. In Singapore, parents wereencouraged to send
their children to English medium schools rather than Chinese medium
schools, in part because interethnic interaction was greater in the former.
This broad characterization of the formation of national education sys-
tems informs our discussion of three issues that accompanied systemization:
centralization versus decentralization, private education versus public educa-
tion, and religious education versus secular education.
Centralization and Decentralization in National Education Systems
Archer (1979) argues that the basic structure of an educational system—cen-
tralized versus decentralized—had important effects on the nature of school
provisions. A centralized bureaucracy was better positioned to engineer edu-
cation systems by ensuring clearer ties and better coordination among vari-
ous parts of the system. Centralization promoted, for example, closer link-
ages among teacher training programs, intended curricular policies, and
national systems of examinations. Decentralized education systems, on the
other hand, involved less explicit controls and oversight of educational pur-
poses, practices, and processes, and thus facilitated more heterogeneous out-
comes. As we have discussed, nations that developed strong state structures
created more centralized educational bureaucracies, whereas nations with
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
29
weak state structures or those organized into federal polities tended to con-
struct more decentralized education systems. Historically, Prussia, France,
Spain, Portugal, and much of Scandinavia best exemplify the more central-
ized systems; England, the United States, Switzerland, and Belgium are
prominent examples of more decentralized systems. As Green (1990: 311)
maintains, “…forms of national [education] systems reflected the nature of
the state which created them.”
Since the end of the 1970s, a neo-liberal discourse that stresses the value
of decentralization has pervaded national policies of educational governance.
Concepts such as efficiency, local participation, power delegation and devolu-
tion, de-concentration, school autonomy, and parental choice have circulated
extensively in national and international policy forums (see Bray, 1999;
Whitty et al., 1998; Dutercq, 2001). In the early 1990s, a survey of developed
countries found that after a decade of policies focused on decentralization,
the concentration of educational power and decision-making authority had
been re-allocated across central, intermediate, and local levels, creating new
modes of governance and regulation (Rideout and Ural, 1993). While central-
ized governance is still relatively strong in France, it has been significantly
reduced in Sweden and Norway (Lauglo, 1990; Hutmacher, 2001).
Despite the historical development of distinctmodels of educational
governance in Europe and North America, rooted in varying state formation
processes and socio-political conditions, recent trends suggest a growing
convergence among countries.On the one hand, nations with highly central-
ized systems, suchas France and Sweden, have incorporated some degree of
educational decentralization by means of deregulation, the devolution of cen-
tral power,and greater school autonomy (for other European examples, see
Brockand Tulasiewicz, 2000).On the other hand, countries with historically
decentralized education systems, suchas Britain and the United States, have
increased centralization by adopting national laws, creating national goals
and standards, or using national funds to equalize local districtexpenditures.
Converging on the middle, most education systems areestablishing various
policies of decentralized governance, even in the areaof curricula (Astiz et al.,
2002).
The centralization-decentralization distinction has considerably less analyti-
cal value when examining postcolonial education systems, in contrast to
European and North American systems. Centralized educational structures pre-
dominated when newly independent nations first established national school
systems. The reasons for this vary, but many argue that the exigencies of politi-
cal independence movements, which brought together diverse—even antago-
nistic—ethnic and cultural groups to oppose colonial occupation, left an indeli-
ble mark of centralistic power. In addition, continental models of educational
governance that favored centralization—particularly in France, Spain, and
Portugal—significantly conditioned educational developments in many former
colonies (Makulu, 1971: 59; Waggoner and Waggoner, 1971: 17; Gale, 1969: 15).
In recent years, most decentralization policies in less-developed states
have been recommended or instigated by international organizations. Rather
than being adapted to local institutional or political conditions, these policies
often come “ready made.” In the highly indebted countries of Latin America,
decentralization measures have been imposed by loan organizations to reduce
public expenditures, especially education costs. The actual implementation of
decentralization policies varies by national context. For example, in Argen-
tina and Chile, decentralization in educational governance has meant a shift
in the locus of control, from national to regional (or provincial) govern-
ments, whereas in Brazil, it has meant a shift from state governments to local
authorities. In all these cases, decentralization reforms took place within dif-
ferent regulatory frameworks and under different market conditions
(Narodowski and Milagros, 2002).
Supporters of educational decentralization in Latin America marshal an
ambitious range of rationales and objectives to advance their reforms:
improvements in basic education, the mobilization of local actors, increased
equity, greater school autonomy, and teacher empowerment. However, they
tend to ignore or minimize the specific conditions in which the reforms are
supposed to be implemented. For example, with limited budgets and tight
financial restrictions, stagnating teacher salaries, and little systematic moni-
toring of educational outcomes, the success of decentralization policies is
questionable. Paradoxes abound, some of which contradict the spirit of the
reforms themselves. For instance, many teachers in the poorer provinces of
Argentina and Brazil are unable to understand or carry out the curricular
directives sent by government authorities, resulting in schools turning to pri-
vate institutions to implement the school “autonomy” projects. Or, in the
cases of El Salvador and Nicaragua, where educational regulations are mini-
mal, financial resources are offered to individuals to establish self-managed
schools (Braslavskyand Gvirtz, 2000).
In short, initial analyses of decentralization reforms in Latin America
indicate that as authorities dramatically reduce public funding of education,
private institutions (some partially supported by the state) begin to blossom.
Middle-and upper-class parents gain access to private schools and leave dete-
riorated public schools to the poor. As a result, social and class inequalities in
educational access deepen. Evidence suggests that decentralization reforms
have adversely impacted the educational opportunities of children from lower
socioeconomic strata.
In the past, many political authorities viewed educational centralization as
apowerful means for creating national citizens, largely by subverting individ-
uals’ loyalties to local entities in competition with the emergent nation-state.
By removing young children from parochial socialization frameworks, and by
placing them in state-oriented educational or training contexts, political loy-
alties to the state (and the nation) were assured (Cohen, 1979: 113). In light of
this, it is important to consider whether the economic and organizational dis-
courses supporting decentralized governance mayinadvertently undermine
the political outcomes to which state-directed, mass education systems have
contributed in the past.
30
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
31
The Tension between Private Schools and Public Education
The principle that national education systems should provide free and com-
pulsory education is deeply engrained in the modern world. In other words,
it is widely believed that every child should have access to formal education in
state-sponsored, public schools (Green, 1990: 3). The development of public
financing of elementary schools by nation states was a long, drawn-out
process. Notwithstanding compulsory education statutes, European states
did not immediately assume responsibility for the financing of schooling, and
supporters of public finance confronted powerful private-school networks.
Prussia and France succeeded in financing elementary schooling at a relatively
early stage, and public funding encouraged families to withdraw their chil-
dren from private institutions. By 1861, public elementary schools in Prussia
outnumbered private schools by a ratio of 34 to 1 (Green, 1990: 3). In France,
the Jules Ferry Law of 1881 rendered elementary education free. As a result,
the state began to financially support private schools, a strategy of increasing
control over these institutions (Reisner, 1927: 41). In the 1960s, the
Guermeur and Debré Laworganized and reinforced the state financing of
private (mainly Catholic) schools, while demanding strict conformity to the
national curriculum. These laws engendered different relationships between
private schools and the state.
In England, until 1833, educational establishments were organized on a
purely voluntary basis. They ranged from dame and charity schools at the pri-
mary level, owned and run by private individuals; through endowed public
schools, which were founded, financed, and regulated by individual
bequests; to the university colleges, which continually asserted their inde-
pendence from state intervention or control (Vaughan and Archer, 1971:
209). Private sponsors funded and governed the elite system of English “pub-
lic” schools, many of which trace their history back several hundred years
(Walford, 1984).
A different set of issues confronted former colonies. In Southeast Asia,
private schools, mainly mission schools, provided a general education in
British Malaya, Singapore, and the Borneo territories. In these and other
parts of Asia, private schools existed at the primary level, but played a much
moresignificant role at the secondarylevel. Private schools were independent
and relied solely on school fees, although they weresubjectto governmental
regulations and were expected to follow the same curriculum as the public
state schools (Wong, 1973: 49–50). In the Philippines, the private sector dom-
inated education at the secondary level (79 percent of enrollments in 1975)
but less so at the primary level (only 5 percent of enrollments). The strong
demand for education among Filipino elites accounted in part for the consid-
erable investment of private capital in secondary educational institutions.
Schools, colleges, and universities operated as profit-making stock corpora-
tions and even declared dividends in their stocks. The extensive private-edu-
cation sector in the country has done little to ensure high standards for quali-
ty in all private schools, many of which suffer from poorly trained teachers
and run-down facilities and equipment (Wong, 1973: 77).
Contemporary Patterns
Inrecent decades, the vast majority of education systems have accommodat-
edvarious forms of private schooling at the primary and secondary levels
(Cummings and Riddell, 1994) though world regions vary significantly in the
degree to which they rely on the private sector at each level (see Table 2).
Private schooling has generally been more prevalent at the secondary level
than at the primary level. World regions vary significantly.
Although types of private schooling vary significantly, schools can be clas-
sified by their legal standing vis-à-vis the state and by their mode of finance.
Specifically, we can ask whether a state has passed regulations or laws legaliz-
ing private schooling and, if so, under what conditions they are allowed to
exist (i.e., the extent of state regulation). We can also ask what proportions of
school budgets are derived from private sources or from governmental ones.
Combining this information determines the overall parameters of private
schooling at each educational level. Generally, private schools that are legally
recognized and largely financed through public funds belong to the national
education system. These private schools incorporate the national curriculum
and must submit to national supervision.
States with highly centralized education systems tend to fully subsidize
education and to discourage private schooling. France, Russia, China, and
Japan best exemplify this tendency. In former communist countries, educa-
tion was considered an important investment for attaining collective state-
defined goals. Thus, the state fully subsidized education and prepared
detailed plans both for human resource development and manpower utiliza-
tion. In contrast, states supporting decentralized education systems tend to
admit private schools in parallel to the public-school network. England and
the United States are prototypes of this modality.
Interest in the privatization of primary and secondary education has flour-
ished in recent years. As weak economic growth or sluggish international
trade creates fiscal crises, governments look for ways to reduce public expen-
ditures, including the centralized funding of public education. In other con-
texts, government officials believe that the qualityand effectiveness of educa-
32
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
Table 2: The Mean Percentage of Private Primary and Secondary Enrollments,
by World Region, circa 1980
Percentage of primary
enrollments in private
schools
Percentage of secondary
enrollments in private
schools
Range
Developed countries 14.3 18.6 1–98
Latin America 17.5 29.5 0–76
Sub-Saharan Africa 24.9 30.3 0–99
North Africa/Middle East 9.1 10.9 0–61
Asia 11.8 27.3 0–93
Source: Cummings and Riddell, 1994.
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
33
tion can be enhanced through privatization and greater competition (and
choice) among providers. As part of a broad shift from state-based to market-
based development strategies, international organizations such as the World
Bank and the IMF have actively supported moves by developing countries to
privatize (and decentralize) education.
In Latin America, the move towards privatization (and the support of
religious education) has been especially pronounced. According to Albornoz
(1993), the Venezuelan government adopted a market discourse, in which
people should be “trained” rather than “educated,” and spoke about “the cost
of education and its usefulness” in private-sector terms. Reforms in favor of
private schools in Argentina and Chile have also relied on market-based dis-
courses in their efforts to increase efficiency and reduce state costs. Recent
studies suggest that private schooling has indeed expanded (Narodowski and
Milagros, 2002). In Latin America, with its long history of class and institu-
tional hierarchies, school labels such as colegios and escuelas articulate not only
the private-sector–public-sector dichotomy, but also deep social inequalities
(Albornoz, 1993).
In sum, decentralization policies, administrative school autonomy,
voucher systems, and school competition reopen an old question about the
value of public school versus private school—a question whose implications
for ensuring free, high quality basic education are still being assessed.
The Tension Between Religious Institutions and Secular Education
Religion and education have a long,intertwined history.Early educational
frameworks trained religious officials and members of the clergy.Over the
years, religious leaders have taught and circulated their ideas, philosophies,
and dogmas through education. Schools have been responsible for inculcat-
ing skills necessaryfor reading sacred texts and for keeping records of reli-
gious activities.Moral education and religious instruction have imbued the
curricular contents of many secular schools.All major world religions have
established schools to sustain religious movements and to ensure“accurate”
interpretations of key religious doctrines.
Historically, the creation of national education systems entailed, in no
small measure, the differentiation of education from other societal institu-
tions, particularly religious ones. A public education system typically meant a
secular system, which often resulted in hostile and antagonistic attitudes
towards religion by state builders and modernizing elites. The extent to
which, and the ways by which, the ties unraveled between educational and
religious institutions varied considerably over time and place. They still do.
Whereas in some countries the two institutions are wholly separated, in theo-
ry if not in practice, in other countries, religion continues to influence the
education of young children. In Saudi Arabia and Israel, for example, reli-
gious education is an integral branch of the national education system. In
France, by contrast, religious schools that do not adopt the official curricu-
lum remain private institutions outside of the public system. In Spain,
despite a constitutional prohibition against a state religion, the country’s
dominant Roman Catholic Church has continued to enjoy preferential treat-
ment by the government (Callahan, 1992).
The historical struggle between religious authorities and the state over the
control of education is illustrated in its most extreme form in France. After
the revolution, republicans were determined to build a new society by edu-
cating and socializing the young. The Republic prohibited religious teaching
in schools and subsequently forbade priests to serve as teachers (Cummings,
1997). In 1801, the concordat between Napoleon and the Pope reinstated
teaching privileges for church officials and reestablished state recognition of
the Church as an educational authority. During much of the nineteenth cen-
tury, primary education was in the hands of Christian schools and other con-
gregations (Reisner, 1927: 34). Despite centralized control and a strong
bureaucracy, French authorities delayed legal measures concerning compul-
sory education until 1882, mainly due to ongoing conflicts with the Church.
The Ferry Law of 1882 resulted in the secularization of the primary school
curriculum. For a state in which the official separation between state and
church took place relatively early, a significant portion of education is still in
the hands of religious authorities (Schneider, 1982: 10). In Spain, the church
had an overwhelming influence on social life, including educational frame-
works.In 1939, Franco re-established Roman Catholicism as the state religion
and required all pupils (even non-Catholics) to learn about religion in school.
Although Spain’snew constitution (1978) separated churchand state, classes
in religion remained and the state continued its subsidy of ecclesiastical
schools, attended by one thirdof the children (Callahan, 1998).Attempts by
the Socialist partyto liberalize education did little to reduce the influence of
the Roman Catholic Church.
In Belgium, as in France, the state-religion conflictover education persist-
ed well into the twentieth century,and produced two parallel education sys-
tems based on the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of education. In addi-
tion to a public system operated by the state and the communities, there was
a“free” system organized by the Catholic Church. After 1884, under a
Catholic government, a protracted process ended in the equalization of the
“free” schools with the community schools. In 1914, the equalization of state
support for all elementary schools was legally confirmed (Schneider, 1982:
10). In Prussia,the law of 1810 made education a secular activity (Green,
1990: 3). Although religion was not forbidden, only certified teachers could
provide religious education in public schools (Cummings, 1997). The Soviet
Union pursued an extreme model of separating state-sponsored education
from religious influences. After the revolution, all schools supported by the
Orthodox Church were abolished.
In the United States, both the strong moral and religious orientations of
the citizenry and a fear of state interference in religious affairs influenced the
differentiation of religion and education. Many early settlers came to America
to establish “God’s kingdom on earth,” where individuals could communicate
directly with God, rather than through the intervention of church officials.
The ability to read the Bible was an essential element in personal commun-
34
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
35
ion; thus, the early Puritan settlements placed a strong emphasis on literacy
and schooling. The U.S. Constitution enshrined the principle of separation of
church and state, but also asserted that education was the responsibility of
local communities, who often tangibly and prominently displayed their reli-
gious sensibilities. Because schools in the United States received funds from
public sources, the principle of separation of church and state led to a second
distinctive feature—the elimination of religious and moral content from the
formal school curriculum. Over time, religious values in the public school
curriculum were transformed into civic values (Cummings, 1997).
Nevertheless, only after Brown v. Board of Education (1954) were religious
influences, mainly Protestant values, minimized in public schools (Tyack,
James, and Benavot, 1987).
Our analysis of the religion-education nexus in postcolonial states con-
centrates on non-Christian countries and refers to three historical periods:
the precolonial, colonial, and postcolonial periods. As we have discussed,
prior to the introduction of Christianity in Asia and Africa, sophisticated
Confucian and Muslim educational frameworks existed (Monroe, 1927; Lee,
2000).In Africa, before Islam swept the continent, indigenous systems of
education wereclosely involved in child socialization. Even today, indige-
nous education remains widespread and diffuse, albeit with little institutional
power. African families and communities expose their young children to myr-
iads of African languages, part of a strong matrix of indigenous experiences
that these children bring with them when they enter the public school sys-
tem. Only in North Africaand the Nile Valley have indigenous languages
been displaced by a powerful language of international currency (Arabic).In
any case, the significance of the indigenous cultural values transmitted by
African languages should not be minimized (Brock-Utne, 2000).
Islamic education developed concurrent to the spread of Islam to North
Africa, and later to West Africaand parts of eastern and central Africa. Islamic
schools and universities flourished centuries beforethe arrival of Christian
evangelism and Western colonialism (Tibawi, 1972).Today, in over 35 African
countries, Islam’sinfluence in the shaping of cultureand education is consid-
erable (Fafunwa, 1982). The large network of Qur’anic schools, some of which
have existed for centuries, serves as a powerful socializing mechanism, incul-
cating regional and communal identities (Morgan and Armer, 1988). Qur’anic
schools are part of a multi-stage system. During the first stages, children are
taught rudimentary knowledge of the Qur’an and then the alphabet of the
Arabic language. During the advanced stage or “secondary level,” a much
broader and deeper curriculum is taught. This includes grammatical inflec-
tions, syntax, logic, arithmetic, algebra, rhetoric and versification, jurispru-
dence, scholastic theology, Islamic laws, and the traditions and commentaries
of the Prophet. At the end of these studies, students (usually male) receive a
“license” allowing them to practice as a teacher, imam, or alkali,depending on
their area of specialization (Mathews and Akrawi, 1949; Fafunwa, 1982).
When Western missionaries arrived in Africa around the mid-nineteenth
century, the first Christian missions on the continent were established.
English-speaking missionaries arrived in Nigeria in 1844, in Uganda after
1877, and in Congo-Leopoldville after 1878. Because “Christianity is a religion
of the book,” education became an important means for preaching and teach-
ing the gospel. In addition, the building of mission schools improved rela-
tions between missionaries and colonial authorities, as both were concerned
with “civilizing” local Africans, especially through the promotion of
European values (Bray et al., 1986: 7). During the height of European colo-
nialism before World War I, religious missions, supported and aided by colo-
nial administrations, provided most education (Connell, 1980: 315). The main
purpose of the missions was to gather and save souls, therefore they attempt-
ed to Christianize (civilize) without necessarily Westernizing (Yates, 1984).
Subsequently, colonial administrations expanded government schools,
although the growth in enrollments varied considerably depending on the
imperial power (Benavot and Riddle, 1988). Colonial systems of education
were conscious, systematic attempts to educate Africans away from their
indigenous cultures (Fafunwa, 1982).
The relationship between Christian mission schools and colonial govern-
ments varied from one region to the next. In some instances, colonial gov-
ernments banned mission schools completely.In most cases, however, mis-
sion schools and colonial administrations divided the labor of education,
which resulted in different norms. In practice, this usually meant that
Christian missions provided primaryeducation for the natives, and the gov-
ernment provided post-primaryschools for the children of the European set-
tlers. Reading,writing,and arithmetic werethe basic pillars of the colonial
curriculum, in addition to religion (Morgan and Armer,1988).The limited
scope of this school curriculum remained largely unchanged despite increased
government involvement in educational affairs.In the decades prior to World
War II, the British Empirepromoted common schooling in its colonies,
especially in Africa(Whitehead, 1981).In the Frenchcolonies, education was
essentially a means of producing a native aristocracywho propagated French
ideals and upheld the French wayof life. In British colonies, therewas a
greater tendencyto “adapt” education to African realities. While British edu-
cation embodied (at least superficially) the ideals of partnership and adapta-
tion, French education stood for association and assimilation (Fafunwa,
1982). In Portuguese colonies, education aimed at evangelizing and civilizing
Africans, as well as providing cheap manual labor. Missionary education for
Africans was poor and ineffective, in sharp contrast to the education provided
to white settlers or assimilated Africans (Cross, 1987).
African parents were initially reluctant to send their children to the mis-
sion and government schools, but did so in greater numbers beginning in the
early twentieth century (Knight, 1955; Connell, 1980: 314; Kelly, 2000). The
mounting pressure of the new social order induced Africans to seek out mis-
sion schools. The acquisition of reading, writing, and basic Western knowl-
edge in “bush,” “village,” or “out” schools became vital for sharing in the
progress that the colonizers promised (Connell, 1980: 315). Under European
colonialism, many traditional education systems disappeared—first shad-
36
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
37
owed by ever-increasing mission schools and later pushed out by the more
extensive education systems of colonial governments.
National education systems became an important tool for shaping the
character of new nations following independence. Government attitudes
towards mission schools ranged from eradication to accommodation. In
most states, education became a secular responsibility, although the ideologi-
cal commitment to secularization varied. In much of Africa, the public part-
nerships that had enabled church-based educational frameworks came to an
end, and many mission schools were banned outright (Makulu, 1971: 14).
African leaders at the UNESCO-sponsored conference held in Addis Ababa in
1961 declared, “If it is to fulfill its many functions satisfactorily, education in
Africa must be African, that is, it must rest on a foundation of a specifically
African culture and be based on special requirements of African progress in
all fields” (ECA/UNESCO,1961: v). Among other things, creating a truly
African education system meant limiting foreign (Western) influences and
asserting state control over private and mission schools.
The tendencyto accommodate traditional educational frameworks was
muchmorepronounced in Southeast Asia. Most governments decided to take
advantage of previously existing (mainly religious) institutions and found ways
to integrate religious education into their national systems. In the Philippines
and Indonesia, educational provisions were significantly strengthened without
destroying relatively autonomous mission schools.Over time, however,the
curricula, practices, and teacher qualifications of the latter converged with those
of the public schools.In Thailand, despite strong government control, the pri-
vate education system continued to flourish (Wong,1973).
Historical Bridges between Religion and Modern Education
Because mass schooling first emerged in Christian areas, it could plausibly be
asserted that Christian values aremost compatible with modern educational
forms.Nevertheless, European and U.S.educational history underscores the
overt tensions between Christianityand modern secular education. Since
World War II, different forms of accommodation between religious authori-
ties and public administrations have evolved. Among non-Christian reli-
gions, many perceive Confucianism, Taoism, and Hinduism as more compat-
ible with modern education than Islam, which is often depicted as relatively
antagonistic towards “modern” sensibilities and educational values. Below,
we consider whether, and how, postcolonial states integrated traditional and
religious values in their national education systems and question the implica-
tions this may have had for contemporary policies of universal education.
For most commentators, Japan confirms the positive effects of accommo-
dating traditional religious values in modern educational forms. Since the
Meiji Revolution, when Japan imported Western educational forms and suf-
fused them with traditional Japanese values, educational and material condi-
tions have improved significantly. Nevertheless, it is worth recalling that
American administrators forced Japan to remove all religious content from
the curriculum after World War II, as it was thought to have contributed to
Japanese imperialism and “aggression.” In recent decades, by contrast, expla-
nations of the superior performance of Japanese pupils (especially in relation
to U.S. pupils) in international achievement studies tend to highlight the suc-
cessful integration of traditional cultural values and modern educational prac-
tices (Fuller et al., 1986).
At the beginning of the twentieth century, China experimented with the
integration of religious and Western values. The Nationalist government,
established in 1901, sought to produce scholarly gentry through the incorpo-
ration of Western educational practices and approaches. Concurrently, the
Nationalist government promoted Confucianism to bolster and legitimate its
political power. Chinese traditions encouraged an unquestioning trust in
authority and conformity with collective goals. Under the slogan “Chinese
learning as the essence and Western learning for its utilitarian purposes,” edu-
cational facilities increased rapidly in China before 1949 (Kwong, 1979; 1988).
Nevertheless, the educational successes of the anti-religious Communist
regimes leave little reason to draw an unambiguous positive assessment of the
role of religion in Chinese education.
In the 1960s, after a wave of de-colonization, many scholars believed that
Western forms of schooling could not be mixed with traditional African edu-
cation in the ways envisioned by African leaders (Coleman, 1965: 53). The his-
torical record does not strongly support this assessment. For example, in
many Muslim areas wherethe penetration of Christian missions was mini-
mal, a considerable number of Islamic schools remained in place (Matthews
and Akrawi, 1949).While some of these schools continued to concentrate on
Qur’anic verses by wayof rote learning,others, notably in Tunisia, taught an
elementary-school course in Arabic, with French as a second language, which
was comparable to that offered in the public sector.In selectschools in
Algeria and Tunisia, qualitysecondaryeducation in a traditional Arabic cul-
ture was available (notably in the College Sadiki in Tunis). In addition, high-
er studies could be pursued in a wide spectrum of Islamic universities in the
Middle East (Morgan and Armer,1988). Findings from the Islamic region of
north Nigeria (Kano) suggest that the two education systems—one modern
and the other (Islamiyya)integrating Western and Qur’anic curricula—have
successfully accommodated each other. In both systems, enrollments and
achievement levels have increased (Morgan and Armer, 1988).
The historical record in West Africa and elsewhere shows that, despite
opposition from the traditionalists, “internal” reforms to Islamic education
(i.e., the introduction of modern secular subjects from within) have been
more successful than those attempted by colonial authorities (Fisher, 1969).
Western perceptions of Islamic education as inherently inflexible or backward
are not borne out by the evidence (Fortna, 2002: 1). According to Brenner
(2000: 307), the so-called Islamic fundamentalism can be better understood
as an effort to combine Muslim doctrine with contemporary technologies of
power, most of which have their origin in European culture. It would seem
that the advance of Western rationalist ideology makes possible the appear-
ance of many contemporary forms of Islamism.
38
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
39
Finally, many European education systems are now reexamining the rela-
tionship between state secular education and religious sensibilities. Especially
in countries with large numbers of Muslim immigrants such as Germany,
Britain, and France, public debates on the separation between state and
church have reopened. In the past, they involved the adherents of
Catholicism, Protestantism, or Judaism; today, the parents of Muslim and
Sikh children demand that state schools recognize their freedom of religious
expression. In France, Catholic organizations are among the most vociferous
defenders of secularism in the education system, seeking to avoid a new ideo-
logical struggle around religion similar to those of the past. Discussions con-
cerning the right of Muslims to wear traditional clothes in public schools
have also emerged in Spain.
Conclusion
Policies that advance localization and decentralization as strategies for
improving the efficiency of national education systems were conceived and
consolidated in the West. They aimed at replacing large, stable, but cumber-
some state bureaucracies with more flexible, effective, responsive modes of
educational governance. When applied to centralized education systems,
decentralization measures in some instances reduced state expenditures but
may also have had socially regressive effects, especially when pursued in badly
funded or highly unequal systems.In Latin America, the movement towards
decentralization brought about a “renaissance” of private and religious educa-
tion, but class inequalities in educational access apparently increased. These
developments illustrate how key aspects of the systemization process (i.e.,
centralization or decentralization, secularization, and privatization) have
important implications for social inequalities and equityissues.
In Muslim areas, and in parts of Africa, the secular versus religious dilem-
ma represents a totally different picture. Western education is still perceived
as “imported” foreign education, promoted first by Christian missionaries
and later by colonial governments.Modern education represents a force that
has previously undermined indigenous traditions, Muslim culture, and
Muslim educational frameworks. When former colonies achieved independ-
ence, secular education gained supremacy and many mission schools were
dismantled. African states and Islamic countries, often supported by foreign
aid programs and international organizations, later launched ambitious uni-
versal education campaigns. Although educational spending and enrollments
have increased, these have rarely produced the impressive socioeconomic
developments that international experts predicted. Economic growth, still
heavily dependent on primary commodities, has been illusive. Many elites
view modern education as having facilitated social unrest through increased
unemployment, dissonance between traditional and modern values, and
intergenerational conflict. Many Muslim scholars wonder whether, and how,
modern education and Muslim culture can be accommodated. In the past,
colonial governments attempted to undermine local education systems.
International agencies also ignored them. In many Asian countries, however,
different accommodations between traditional values and modern education-
al practices have proved much more successful. We think that there is much
to be gained from examining how countries accomplished this challenging
task in the past.
INEQUALITY AND EQUITY ISSUES
The Historical Legacies of Elitist and Democratic Education
Schools (or equivalent educational frameworks) have existed in many ancient
civilizations, including Egypt, China, Rome, and Greece (Cohen, 1979). The
basic function of these schools was to socialize and train an elite class who
would govern and administer the country or empire. The education of elite
classes entailed the acquisition of knowledge and skills related to warfare,
diplomacy, religion, and politics. Additional emphasis was placed on the
development of character, virtue, and refinement. These educational frame-
works were expected to instill loyalty to the central power and to construct a
clear status boundary between the literate, cultured elite and the illiterate
commoners.
Schools devoted to the consolidation and reproduction of elites through
the education of the children of privileged or propertied classes have a long
historyin Europe (Ringer,1979; Bourdieu, 1996; Cookson and Percell, 1985;
Cummings, 2003).In Germany,the education of the cultured upper middle
class, in contrast to the business-oriented upper middle class, stressed person-
al cultivation, probity,and social courtesy.The education of French elites
emphasized linguistic proficiency,academic distinction, and devoted service
to the state, either in administrative or militaryaffairs. The English public
schools, whichwerethe principal training ground for the attainment of elite
status, inculcated a sense of honor,faith, entitlement, and privilege, together
with a willingness to serve and defend the countryand British Empire. In
practice, membership in European elite classes, whether political, economic,
or cultural, meant receiving a classical academic education involving a rigor-
ous program of humanistic, and sometimes scientific, studies at a selective
institution or boarding school.
Although private institutions had served the children of dominant classes
in the United States since the founding of the early colonies, democratic and
egalitarian views permeated the historical development of schooling (Bailyn,
1960; Cremin, 1970; Tyack, 1974; Kaestle, 1983). Widespread but locally con-
trolled schools, education as a means for creating literate (Bible reading) and
morally upright citizens, and “having the rich and the poor educated togeth-
er”—these notions not only reflected important ideological legacies of the
nation’s founding fathers, but also were considered indispensable for the sur-
vival of the republic (Ulich, 1967). Such ideas, supported by strong
Protestant principles, infused the common school movement in the nine-
teenth century, and had important consequences for the spread of schooling
in both rural and urban areas. By the end of the nineteenth century, enroll-
40
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
41
ment in elementary schools (public and private) was almost universal. The
expansion of secondary education in the United States was unprecedented,
with enrollment rates increasing from 7 percent of the youth population in
1890 to 80 percent in the 1960s (Ulich, 1967: 242–3). The American high
school was the first entirely free secondary school in the world (Green, 1990:
17). By the end of the twentieth century, the provision of post-primary educa-
tional opportunities in the United States outranked all other countries, with
the possible exception of Japan (Cummings, 1997).
Nevertheless, race, ethnicity, and immigrant status strongly affected access
to, and completion of, secondary and higher education in the United States.
Notwithstanding egalitarian conceptions and doctrines of equal opportunity,
many of which became the object of U.S. Supreme Court rulings, racial and
ethnic inequalities in educational outcomes continued unabated throughout
the twentieth century. Many American educators questioned whether a strat-
egy of equal educational opportunity was sufficient to substantially reduce
educational inequalities. Only through compensatory measures, they main-
tained, would real progress in access to secondary and higher education be
attained (Cummings, 1997).
From Elitist to Popular Education in Europe
The meritocratic ideal—that individuals, whatever their origins, should
be given opportunities to carrytheir talents to full realization through educa-
tion—was late in coming to Europe (Ringer,1979; Maynes, 1985).So,too,
was the related notion that national progress depends on the extent to which
asocietyprovides educational services that enable all its citizens to develop
their talents and capabilities.Traditional European forms of secondary educa-
tion, provided in a gymnasium, lycée, “public,” or grammar school, repre-
sented an advanced stage of liberal education and a narrow gatewayto higher
social and occupational statuses.Indeed, throughout Europe, academic sec-
ondaryschools began as institutions serving universities, with the purpose of
preparing upper-class youth for study in higher education. Thus, securing
meritocratic ideals meant, in practical terms, that secondary education would
need to be democratized, thereby reducing, even eliminating, the class advan-
tages of elite children (Sutton, 1965). Moreover, institutions of secondary
education were firmly entrenched in rigid selection mechanisms. These had
produced bifurcated structures: on the one hand, a variety of academic-ori-
ented secondary education systems, including preparatory classes for second-
ary schools, were mainly reserved for the children of higher status families or
those who could afford to pay tuition fees; on the other hand, short-term and
typically terminal programs provided access to primary (and some post-pri-
mary) education for the children of the popular classes.
From a historical perspective, the shift from elitist to more inclusive edu-
cation systems involved several, not always sequentially organized, transfor-
mations. Many countries made an early transition by broadening access to
primary schools while simultaneously increasing the number of traditionally
elitist secondary schools. In some areas, selective secondary schools, which
had exclusively served the aristocracy, began catering to the needs of the
growing bourgeoisie and urban middle classes. Another important turning
point was the alteration of secondary education entrance examinations, espe-
cially the degree to which meritocratic criteria supplanted class-based ones.
Many European countries began developing new national entry examina-
tions with stronger academic or IQ-like elements. Pupils who succeeded in
these exams were allowed to enroll in elite secondary schools. Children who
were unsuccessful, or who chose not to sit for the exams, could remain in
school for several additional grades or enroll in vocational programs or
tracks, both of which were considered less desirable alternatives.
In the aftermath of World War II, especially with the ascendance of the
United States as the major economic and political superpower, intergovern-
mental organizations such as UNESCO and OECD began articulating progres-
sive American ideas and lent their support to principles of equal educational
opportunity. The use of highly selective entry examinations came under severe
criticism as an obstacle to the “democratization” of secondary education. In
many countries, an array of observation and counseling procedures eventually
replaced these exams.The new procedures were meant not to select pupils, but
to classifythem according to their abilities, interests, and achievements at the
conclusion of an extended period of compulsoryeducation.
The prolongation of compulsory education by two to four years (see
Table 1) not only extended formal schooling,but served, at least in theory,to
universalize access to (lower) secondaryeducation. In many instances, the
supply of grammar schools, lycées, and gymnasiums was too limited to meet
the increasing demand for secondaryeducation. Moreover,the traditional
curriculum, stressing classical languages and academic subjects, was called
into question because it contained subjectemphases of less value to heteroge-
neous student populations.Initiatives to expand and diversifysecondaryedu-
cation systems gained momentum, including the reinvigoration or addition
of various types of vocational and technical education to existing classical and
modern curricula (Resnik, 2001).
Significantly,the post-World War II transformation of secondary educa-
tion occurred during a particularly activist and dynamic period in European
political history. The move to ensure greater educational opportunities and
reduce social inequalities corresponded to political developments in Western
Europe, in particular the ascension to power of democratic socialist parties
(Wittrock et al., 1991). Led by cadres of political leaders imbued with strong
modernizing visions and a post-war “trenches” feeling of solidarity, many
European governments launched large-scale educational reforms including
the extension of compulsory education, the establishment of more inclusive
school types, and the massive expansion of secondary school enrollments.
Though the pace and outcomes of these changes varied from country to
country, the transformation of secondary education became a central target of
reformists’ plans. Indeed, the shift to mass secondary education involved not
only a structural change, but also a major social shift. States that had histori-
cally created sharp institutional (and class) divisions between primary and
42
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
43
secondary education moved to construct a more integrated and less class-
based tripartite system involving primary, lower-secondary, and upper-sec-
ondary education.
In the wake of these reform initiatives, three basic types of European edu-
cation systems emerged (Schneider, 1982):
•The Scandinavian comprehensive school (Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and
Finland). School reforms in Scandinavia led to the joining of primary and
middle schools into a nine-year basic (and compulsory) program of com-
prehensive schooling. The new system (nine years of primary education and
three to four years of post-primary education) was legally institutionalized
in Sweden (1962), Finland (1970), and Denmark (1975).
•The mixed systems found in Great Britain, France, and Italy. Specific equiv-
alents to the comprehensive schools were legally implemented without,
however, relegating the compulsory education of all pupils to one type of
basic school.
•The traditional systems found in Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, and in
most German Länder and Swiss cantons. Legislated reforms created a less
comprehensive integration of secondary schools and specific national pat-
terns of subdivided systems dominate in these countries. The tripartite sys-
tem usually included the classic, modern, and technical secondary schools,
which form separate tracks.
Expanding Secondary Education in Postcolonial States
Two “American” principles—one, that societies should avoid “wasting talent”
and two, that secondary education should be open to all academically capable
youth, regardless of social background—not only took root in Europe after
World War II, but also gained support in education systems throughout the
world. Social science experts, as well as intergovernmental organizations,
were instrumental in the circulation of these emergent “democratic” concep-
tions of secondary schooling. Although the transformation of secondary edu-
cation in the United States and Europe followed in the wake of a long period
of primary education consolidation and universalization, in Africa, Asia, and
Latin America, widespread illiteracy, low quality instruction, and educational
wastage in primary schools remained salient problems when secondary
schooling became the object of reform (Rama, 1983).
Furthermore, colonial legacies had contributed to idiosyncratic educa-
tional structures in many developing countries. During the colonial era, edu-
cational frameworks in Africa and Asia were institutionally segmented, elitist,
and racially divided; most contributed to furthering Western hegemony and
domination over native populations. In many African colonies, for example,
indigenous children learned rudimentary skills in mission or village “bush”
schools, but few passed the rigorous examinations for entrance into upper-
elementary or secondary grades. At the same time, colonial authorities active-
ly developed modern academic and technical education for the children of
European settlers. Such schools nurtured an elite, racially exclusive group
with a shared culture and ideology, who held a monopoly over high-level
skills taught in academic schools (King, 1990).
Following independence, African and Asian governments were exposed
to two types of pressures: the commitment of their leaders to weaken or dis-
mantle the educational vestiges of colonial rule and the pressure from inter-
national agencies to expand education as a condition for socioeconomic
development. Certain educational structures were democratized—massive
efforts were undertaken to advance free and compulsory primary education
(UNESCO,1958). However, governments rarely transformed the underlying
principles and policies that had governed secondary education during the
colonial period. In former French and Belgian colonies, for example, a reluc-
tance to break away from policies that had originated under French rule lim-
ited the conceptualization and design of educational reforms (Johnson, 1987).
More often than not, the elitist character of secondary education remained
virtually unchanged: literary and academic instruction continued to be
emphasized over practical training or market skills; rote learning continued
to dominate classroom interactions; and schooling remained driven by
examinations (Khan, 1981).The educational standards of former imperial
powers cast long shadows over the curricular contents and educational quali-
fications in African and Asian secondary schools. Most newly independent
regimes lacked the necessary resources to implement major changes to sec-
ondaryeducation. Others have argued, however,that retaining the educa-
tional status quo served the interests of newly empowered elites (Gauhar,
1981; Khan, 1981).
As in Africaand Asia, secondaryeducation in Latin Americamirrored
European institutions, whichwerepredominantly elitist and academic in
character.Due to the long-term politicization of education and the historical
emphasis on higher education (both public and private),Latin American
countries developed extremely unequal educational structures in whichuni-
versitysectors flourished (enrollment rates approximated those in Europe)
while primaryeducation languished. Secondaryschools mainly served as
highly selective institutional channels for universityentrance and the attain-
ment of elite status. Although universal education was legislated in most
Latin America countries, the laws were unevenly applied. Children in urban
areas enjoyed vastly superior educational opportunities and mobility
prospects than those residing in rural areas. The rising social demand for edu-
cation, the need to elicit support from politically dominant groups to meet
these demands, and the limited resources with which educational reforms
were implemented led many Latin American states to view educational
reform as a necessary first step to reduce social inequalities. Parties represent-
ing middle classes called for an extension of secondary education and greater
access to higher education, even though inequalities in elementary education
were rampant (Rama, 1983).
Over time, educational developments in some postcolonial states created
new problems. In countries that vigorously expanded access to primary edu-
cation, many school graduates faced a severe shortage of secondary schools as
44
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
45
well as a dearth of job opportunities or training programs in the labor mar-
ket. These problems were accentuated as the overall social demand for educa-
tion increased (Johnson, 1987). In Muslim countries where secondary educa-
tion had been expanded, “armies of educated unemployed youth” reflected
the unmet needs of the professional labor market (Khan, 1981). Ethiopia and
countries in Francophone Africa encountered similar problems (Germa, 1982;
Johnson, 1987). In short, although many viewed the expansion and transfor-
mation of secondary education as a universal mandate relevant to all less-
developed school systems, educational realities on the ground undermined
the realization of this mandate in most postcolonial states.
During the 1970s and 1980s, international agencies encouraged develop-
ing countries to adopt new types of educational innovations based on human
capital models and neoliberal approaches to education. These included the
restructuring and diversification of schools, a greater curricular emphasis on
practical education, policies to upgrade teacher training and qualifications,
and the introduction of new technologies and pedagogical approaches.
Initially rejected by many national educational authorities, especially in
Francophone Africa, such innovations were perceived as “neo-colonial”
attempts by international powers to impose new forms of “second-class” edu-
cation. Still, initial modifications diminished the elite character of secondary
education. For example, some countries established programs in agricultural,
craft and technical training,and lifelong learning.Others incorporated new
teaching methods, indigenous languages, and communityleaders into the
structureand content of their education systems (Johnson, 1987).
In sum, many postcolonial states have committed themselves ideological-
ly in recent decades to the transformation and expansion of traditional sec-
ondaryschools to serve morediverse educational, social, and economic pur-
poses.Although an increasing number of states adhereto this policyposition,
actual reforms to secondaryeducation sectors have been limited and uneven.
Private secondaryschools have grown to satisfyunmet demand among
advantaged social classes.Moreoften than not, this expansion has not
increased democratization but instead increased segmentation of different
social strata.
Despite the many differences in the massification of secondary education
in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, several common characteristics may be
observed. First, universal access to and completion of primary education
have yet to be achieved. Second, the limited extension of secondary educa-
tion mainly serves elite groups and advantaged social classes. Third, reforms
to secondary education have rarely improved social mobility or social and
economic conditions for the vast majority of the population. Educational
principles circulated by intergovernmental organizations played an influential
role in reforming national educational policies, but patterns of educational
expansion at the primary, secondary, and tertiary levels, historically unbal-
anced in postcolonial states, continue to generate substantial social and spa-
tial inequalities.
Hierarchy, Diversification, and Comprehensiveness in Secondary Education
The historical transformation of secondary education involved at least three
interrelated shifts: 1) the expansion of the purposes of secondary schooling;
2) the establishment of new selection mechanisms (or the discontinuation of
old ones) to ease the transition between primary and secondary education;
and 3) the development of diversified programs of study, curricular offerings,
and/or school types, which address the heterogeneous interests and needs of
expanding student populations. Our previous discussion concentrated on the
first two shifts; we examine the third shift below. Historical initiatives to
reshape and diversify the contours of secondary schooling encompassed a
wide range of structural and programmatic reforms (Kandel, 1930). We dis-
cuss several prominent examples in the movement towards diversification.
Incorporating Science and Vocational Training: England and Germany
Secondary education in England traditionally entailed an intellectually
demanding program of academic studies in the classical languages, history,
geography, and the humanistic evolution of Western civilization. Revisions
to the academic curriculum in England were slow in coming (Goodson,
1987). Although England was the most advanced industrial society, scientific
and technological studies, vocational training, and apprenticeship were
almost completely disregarded. The privileged economic situation of the
British Empire, as well as their confidence in the ability of grammar schools
to create an elite class of cultured gentlemen imbued with an ethos of honor,
service, and entitlement, provided little impetus for educational innovation.
Moreover, as the Taunton Commission
10
(1864–8) later explained, England
had produced a bevy of outstanding inventors, engineers, and industrialists,
most of whom had little or no formal education. The country’s laissez-faire
reliance on self-made men to carry its economy forward partly explains its his-
torically weak emphasis on science instruction, both pure and applied.
Indeed, as late as 1800, there were virtually no facilities for technical or indus-
trial education in England, and interest in science-oriented instruction in sec-
ondary schools was minimal.
Things began to change as the preeminence of British industries deterio-
rated in the later part of the nineteenth century,especially due to growing
competition in overseas markets. Political leaders and academic elites alike
increasingly recognized that science and technology play influential roles in
national life. Oxfordand Cambridge established professorships and study
programs in the natural and physical sciences. The study of science, primarily
academic in nature, gained visibility at all levels of the English education sys-
tem. Schools increasingly encouraged the teaching of technical subjects, also
based on a textbook approach.
46
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
10. The Taunton Commission on secondary education publicized the lack of grammar
schools in many towns and recommended the establishment of rate-aided secondary
schools and increasing girls’ access to secondary education.
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
47
An even more significant step towards technical education developed
among institutes providing further education to adult workers, typically after
work hours. In the early nineteenth century, the first “Mechanics Institutes”
were founded (in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Haddington, and London) with the
aim of “instructing artisans in scientific principles of the arts and manufac-
tures” and “diffusing useful knowledge.” These institutes not only offered
classes in general education, they also established a tradition of emphasizing
scientific and technical education over practical craft instruction. This tradi-
tion was to persist well into the twentieth century. Overall, the tendency to
associate secondary education with academic studies (mainly the classics) and
technical education with further education for adults contributed to the weak
status of science education and the slow development of vocational education
in English schools.
German history offers a richly contrasting model of incorporating science
instruction and vocational training into public schools. Much earlier than
other countries, German leaders viewed science and technology as key factors
for industrial development and created a complex and well-integrated frame-
work of vocational secondaryeducation. Vocational programs were seen not
only as preparing working-class children for entrance into the labor market,
but also as an effective means for their moral socialization and civic training.
General “improvement” schools, whose sessions were first held on Sundays
and evenings, wereintroduced in order to supplement the “imperfect” gener-
al education of working-class boys and girls.Legislation compelled industrial
employers to allow workers under the age of 18 to attend such“improve-
ment” schools (Beckwith, 1913).Over the course of the nineteenth century,
German authorities established a varietyof industrial schools: supplemental
schools for young workers, middle-technical and trade schools for master
tradesmen and lower grade technicians, and highly advanced and scientifical-
ly oriented technical high schools for the leaders of industries.These industri-
al schools werefunded and supported by private individuals, guilds, trade
unions, merchants’ associations, and towns.
Acentral aspectof vocational education that emerged in Germany was the
formalization of an elaborate system of training and apprenticeships. The sys-
tem encouraged young adolescents (apprentices) to acquire practical vocation-
al training in industrial workshops, rather than in school, within the parame-
ters set forth in legally binding contracts. When combined with limited
school-based courses, this dual system became the cornerstone of a German
model that mediated the transition of young people from the completion of
compulsory education into various occupational statuses in the labor market.
Overall, industrial and technical education in Germany evolved concur-
rently with the spread of universal schooling. Indeed, vocational education
was central to the movement to extend compulsory schooling. Industrial edu-
cation in German secondary schools was fundamentally linked to the preemi-
nence of scientific and technological studies in German institutions of higher
education. Although the gymnasium privileged high-status classical studies,
the Ober-realschule,with its strong scientific bias, was also highly regarded. In
contrast to England, scientific and technological studies in Germany were not
considered an “unsuitable” education for respectable citizens. The German
state viewed technical education and apprenticeship programs as moral educa-
tion and technical training for young people destined for industrial positions.
Nevertheless, scholars have commented that vocational education in Germany
typically reinforced paternalistic attitudes by government officials and
strengthened existing social divisions (the stande)in German society.
Immediately after their completion of compulsory education, pupils from
lower social strata entered the world of work through apprenticeship pro-
grams, thereby foregoing opportunities to enter institutions of higher learning
and, through them, to improve their socioeconomic status.
The contrasting English and German approaches to vocational education
paralleled developments in other parts of Europe. In some countries, such as
France and Italy, the status of technical and vocational education was margin-
alized in relation to academic secondary education. In other countries, such
as Switzerland and Austria, key aspects of the German model were adopted
and vocational education and training became integral, relatively high-status
components of post-primaryschooling. During the 1900–1945 period, the
introduction of new vocational and technical education programs slowed.
Continued reliance upon on-the-job training and a corresponding skepticism
about the benefits of textbook-based technical instruction contributed to the
indifference towards the application of scientific researchin secondary
schools (Evans, 1982).
After World War II, however,vocational education experienced a period
of relative rejuvenation in Europe. Many governments expanded vocational,
technical, and further education programs as well as instruction in the pure
and applied sciences at tertiary-level institutions.Shortages of trained man-
power and the cost of industrial weakness in the face of increased competi-
tiveness justified official policies in support of these programs.In addition,
interest in the industrial application of researchand development grew
markedly,increasing the demand for middle-and high-level scientists, tech-
nologists, and technicians.Current and futureworkers became interested in
obtaining vocational education and training (VET)qualifications because
their salary and promotion prospects were increasingly tied to these (Evans,
1982: 227–8).
In short, the expansion and diversification of secondary education in
post–World War II Europe was greatly influenced by the development of
vocational education frameworks, on the one hand, and the incorporation of
science and technology subjects in previously humanities-dominated school
curricula, on the other. Although their historical circumstances differed, most
European governments become convinced of the benefits of vocational edu-
cation and training and developed policies in support of VET.Many parents
and academics, however, held less sanguine views about the benefits of VET.
In any case, popular demands to improve equality in educational opportunity
were often used by the supporters of vocational education to defend its status
in a reformed secondary education sector.
48
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
49
Comprehensive Schooling in the United States
Emerging in the late nineteenth century and flourishing in the years follow-
ing World War I, the comprehensive high school embodied a uniquely
American vision of post-primary education. It sought to encapsulate demo-
cratic values and pragmatic principles by combining the academic, college-
preparatory purposes of small, often private, academies with a broad set of
curricular offerings that addressed the interests and occupational aspirations
of an increasingly diverse student population (Commission on the
Reorganization of Secondary Education, 1918). The model of the comprehen-
sive high school had roots in psychological studies on human intelligence
(e.g., Thorndike’s multifaceted approach), in Dewey’s (1916) pragmatic edu-
cational philosophy (e.g., schools should train pupils to use their wits and tal-
ents in order to better serve society), and in utilitarian views of education’s
relationship to the labor market (e.g., vocational courses, which enable more
manually inclined pupils to realize their potentialities, serve both the individ-
ual and the industrializing economy) (Schmida, 1964).
The comprehensive high school not only reflected an anti-elitist, egalitari-
an ideal in which academically and socially diverse students studied a com-
mon core of curricular subjects, but also fostered the “elective principle,”
allowing students to choose from a wide range of course offerings (Vaizey,
1965). In addition to Latin, biology, history, and physical education, high
schools offered “practical” subjects such as shop, home economics, basket
weaving, or driver’s training (Ulich, 1967). This curricular structure, better
adapted to the heterogeneity of talents and abilities among the youth popula-
tion, called into question the relevance of the humanities-oriented academic
programs found in Europe (Sutton, 1965: 60). It also problematized the prac-
tice of selecting and channeling students into separate academic and voca-
tional secondary schools at a relatively young age. Emerging studies on
human multiple intelligences opposed selection mechanisms and favored
fully articulated counseling systems (Conant, 1959). Far from being elitist
institutions targeting a small portion of school-age children, U.S. high
schools became inclusive institutions that sought to accommodate large seg-
ments of students interested in both academic and vocational studies
(Cummings, 1997).
Although comprehensive schooling “softened” the sharp distinction
between academic and vocational studies by transforming between-school
hierarchies into intra-school ones, it did not eliminate it entirely. Vocational
programs in the United States, directed at pupils of lower socioeconomic sta-
tus who had difficulties performing in academic programs, continued to bear
the stigma of a “second class” education. Although comprehensive high
schools contributed to the unprecedented growth of secondary education in
the United States by offering more diverse courses to heterogeneous popula-
tions, they continued to act as powerful mechanisms of social stratification
(Kerckhoff, 1995). Overall, secondary education in the United States con-
fronted a much weaker elitist tradition and considerably less intellectual
opposition to vocational education than in England. The comprehensive
high school reflected a pragmatic, instrumental view of education in which
vocational subject matter could be easily integrated in an ever-expanding
array of course offerings.
Secondary Education Reform in Postwar Europe
In the aftermath of World War II, European states needed to reconstruct
not only their economies and polities, but also their education systems.
American involvement in European reconstruction via massive aid programs
in the Marshall Plan and through its growing influence in international
organizations, mainly UNESCO and OECD,provided an auspicious context
for spreading U.S.-based educational principles (e.g., equality of educational
opportunity, expanded secondary education) and models of schooling (e.g.,
comprehensive high schools). The growing predominance of U.S. social sci-
ence communities, in which leading scholars extolled the virtues of human
capital and modernization theories that linked education and economic
growth, also impacted educational reforms in Europe. A dearth of scientific
and technological education incited Western European education systems
to promote programs in these areas, especially following the Sputnik affair
in 1957.
The above conditions, together with an activist political leadership,
resulted in the passage of substantial educational reforms, whichsought to
foster more egalitarian, morecomprehensive, and less hierarchical secondary
education systems.Although the timing,scope, and implementation of these
reforms varied from countryto country,the following elements wereinte-
grated (in some form or another) into most educational initiatives:
•A prolongation of compulsory education into secondary education;
•Attempts to blur the hierarchy between academic and non-academic studies
(art, informatics, dance, etc.) by greater diversification of subject offerings;
•A tendency towards establishing comprehensive secondary schools; and
•An increase of science-oriented studies at all educational levels and in most
programs of study.
In addition, therewereconcerted attempts to sustain and improve voca-
tional education. Vocational education was transformed into vocational edu-
cation and training (VET)with the addition of new training programs that
emphasized modern skills and competencies. In some countries, improve-
ments to VET occurred at the upper-secondary level, in others, at the post-sec-
ondary level. In almost all cases, VET programs increased their emphasis on
general education subjects and reduced restrictions for graduates who wanted
to enter post-secondary institutions. Expanding education in general, and
retooling VET programs in particular, tapped into deeply held convictions
that such policies would meet the demand for moderately and highly skilled
employees in European labor markets and would help sustain economic
growth (Resnik, 2001).
50
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
51
Overall, three basic patterns of vocational and technical education
emerged in Western Europe:
•After completing full-time compulsory education, pupils receive instruction
in a specific craft from the age of 11 or 12 (e.g., Netherlands and Belgium, in
the past).
11
•After completing full-time compulsory education, pupils are provided with
compulsory part-time vocational education (e.g., the Berufsschule in
Germany and Switzerland).
•Pupils study in general education frameworks until 15 or 16, after which
they take courses specifically directed towards the acquisition of qualifica-
tions needed for a chosen career (e.g. France, Italy, Sweden, and the United
Kingdom).
Differences in European education and training systems derived from the
historical traditions of national structures, practices, and institutional cultures
(Green, 1997: 178). Patterns of vocational education and training resulted
specifically from the inter-relationship of national labor market structures and
education systems (Ashton and Green, 1996). Some convergence in
European secondary education systems became apparent as almost all coun-
tries established three types of secondary programs: a general or academic
program, a broadly vocational or technical program, and a vocational pro-
gram that prepared students for particular occupations (Green, Wolf, and
Leney,1999).
Suchsecondaryschool divisions have led to stratification. (Due to space
and time restrictions, we have defined these as outside the bounds of the
present article.) Research has demonstrated that access to differentiated sec-
ondary-level programs in Europe and elsewhere is correlated with students’
origins (Blossfeld and Shavit, 1993).Children from minority and immigrant
groups areoften channeled to vocational tracks and schools. Examples of this
include Moroccan and Algerian students in France, Turkish students in
Germany, Pakistani and Indian pupils in Britain, Indonesians in the
Netherlands, and Muslims in Canada (Eldering,1996; Zine, 2001).
In recent decades, intensifying global economic competition has further
strengthened the official view that education and training are critical factors
in increasing economic performance and competitive advantage (Green,
1997: 173). Because they are unable to compete with the significantly lower
wage levels of many jobs in less-developed countries, European states have
instead concentrated on value-added, knowledge-based production and serv-
ices, which necessitate higher-level skills and extensive worker flexibility
(Finegold and Soskice, 1988, cited in Green, 1997: 182). Many countries have
undertaken strategies to strengthen vocational education, especially work-
based programs leading to certification that involve contextualized learning
in firms (Lerman, 2001). Spain recently implemented a new VET policy
11. In recent years, the Netherlands and Belgium have extended compulsory education to
ages 17–18 and have adopted a system that approximates the second pattern listed (IBE,
2003).
(Bonal, 2001), and Sweden initiated a new tertiary-level VET policy during
the 1990s (Lindell, 2004). The British government promoted a “Skills
Revolution” (Pring, 2004) within the framework of new vocational educa-
tion and training programs (Avis, 2004), while the Netherlands increased the
status of work-based learning (van de Stege, 2003). In addition to VET,all
governments have advanced policies to extend individual learning and skill
enhancement beyond secondary education through various forms of lifelong
learning and adult education, which are based in communities, workplaces,
or the academy (Green, 1997: 177).
Vocational Education in the Postcolonial States
The vocational versus general education controversy in African countries and
other postcolonial states can be traced back to the colonial period. The main
objectives of education supplied by colonial governments were twofold: first,
to provide educational services of high standards to expatriates’ children; and
second, to train local elites to fill administrative, commercial, and teaching
jobs in colonial administrations (Kelly and Altbach, 1978). By and large, colo-
nial schools closely mirrored their counterparts in Europe—bookish, aca-
demic, and designed to preparepupils for rigorous examinations. Native
populations in European colonies were taught basic skills (i.e., reading, writ-
ing, and arithmetic) in mission schools or government-aided village schools.
In some instances, schools provided instruction in practical or technical skills,
typically farming and crafts production (Fafunwa, 1982).
Influential reports seeking to reform education in European colonies
began circulating after World War I. The Phelps-Stokes Fund, representing
the interests of several British and American missionarybodies, appointed a
group called the African Education Commission (AEC)to tour Africaand
make recommendations for the improvement of mission-based education.
In 1922, the same year that LordLugardpublished his statements on indirect
rule, the AEC published a plan to reform African education, recommending
that it be adapted to “communityneeds.” Because African economies were
predominantly agricultural, the AEC reasoned, school curricula should
emphasize the dignity, importance, and skills associated with agricultural
labor.
12
The British Colonial Office, persuaded by many AEC recommendations,
commissioned its own policy reports, the first of which was published by the
Advisory Committee on African Education in 1925 (Mayhew, 1938). This
report maintained that “education should be adapted to the mentality, apti-
tudes, occupations and traditions of the various peoples, conserving as far as
possible all sound and healthy elements in the fabric of their social life.” The
adaptation of education—more practical, vocational, and suited to native
52
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
12. According to the AECplan, the education of native Africans would also entail a strong
cultural element: it should seek to civilize them (convince them to abstain from “barbaric”
indigenous practices) while sustaining the distinction between European and African cul-
tures. In the words of the AEC,education should combine “the self-confidence of culture
with the simplicityof Africans.”
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
53
needs—would mitigate the destabilizing impact of social and economic
changes to traditional life under European colonialism. Subsequent reports
underscored the need to expand educational opportunities and also reiterated
the importance of adapting the structure and content of government-aided
schools to local realities (Fafunwa, 1982; Bray et al., 1986). In Asia, too, initial
efforts towards vocational education were introduced during the first half of
the twentieth century (Tillak, 2002).
After World War II, many national leaders in newly independent coun-
tries advanced arguments in favor of vocational education. Leaders in India,
China, Tanzania, and Ghana, to name but a few, called for the diversification
of school curricula and establishment of vocational education programs as
means to enhance agricultural production, stem migration to urban areas,
curb the number of unemployed school leavers, and transform work-related
attitudes among youth.
Institutional support for vocational and technical education also gained
momentum. The Addis Ababa Plan for African Educational Development,
adopted in 1961, emphasized the need to orient secondaryeducation to eco-
nomic and technological development, which required a shift in enrollments
from general education to vocational and technical education (Maté, 1969).
UNESCO(1974; 1979a) and other intergovernmental organizations endorsed
similar recommendations, as a 1979 UNESCO statement exemplifies: “techni-
cal and vocational education is a prerequisite for sustaining the complex
structureof modern civilization and economic and social development…the
rapid technological and educational changes of the last decade requirenew,
creative, and efficient efforts in technical and vocational education to improve
education as a whole for social, economic and cultural development” (1979a).
An influential World Bank sector policypaper on education characterized
school curricula as excessively theoretical and abstract, weakly tied to local
conditions, and insufficiently concerned with developing skills for,and posi-
tive attitudes towards, manual work (World Bank, 1974). The notion that
vocational education could help overcome shortages in skilled manpower,
enhance productivity,and contribute to economic growth diffused rapidly to
developing countries through regional conferences and special commissions
(Gimeno, 1981; Parmers, 1962; Porter, 1970).
Beginning in the 1960s, international agencies targeted vocational educa-
tion and training for substantial institutional funding. At the time, the World
Bank was the largest source of international financial support for VET and
invested substantial sums in projects involving vocational and diversified sec-
ondary schools (see Table 3). While the percentage of VET funds allocated to
secondary-level programs declined between 1963–76 and 1977–88 (dropping
from 54 percent to 20 percent), the absolute amount of investments between
these two periods increased. (Agrowing interest in non-formal education
involved programs to enable out-of-school youth to acquire vocational or
technical skills applicable for formal wage employment or self-employment).
Overall, with generous international financing and widespread belief in the
economic legitimacy of VET,many Asian, African, and Latin American coun-
tries initiated prevocational, vocational, and technical education or training
programs in the 1960s and 1970s.
Nevertheless, disappointment and disillusion over vocational education
outcomes proliferated (Chapman and Windham, 1985; Wong, 1973: 36–40;
Psacharopoulus and Loxley, 1985; Psacharopoulos, 1987). Many critiques of
VET programs in postcolonial states recalled themes first articulated by Foster
(1965) in his seminal work on the “vocational school fallacy.” Foster maintains
that academic schools in Ghana were actually perceived as vocational because
they led to the most desirable jobs in the modern sector (e.g., clerical jobs,
government positions). Vocational education, he argues, was likely regarded
as inferior because it was orientated towards less attractive vocations. In addi-
tion, vocational training, especially when directed towards wage employ-
ment, would not by itself produce jobs. Although it might redistribute who
gets existing jobs and eventually contribute to increased productivity and
employment opportunities, without changes in labor market conditions,
benefits of vocational training were unlikely. Beginning in the late 1970s,
internal evaluations of projects supported by the World Bank highlighted the
acute problems engendered by diversifying curricula and supporting voca-
tional education: VETprograms necessitated high capital and operating costs;
low salaries made it difficult to recruit qualified teachers; prevocational
courses in diversified schools wereunder-enrolled due to “cultural biases”
against technical subjects; many technical and diversified school graduates
postponed entering the labor market and instead entered tertiary-level insti-
tutions; among those who entered the labor market, many were unable to
find jobs in their fields of training; links between VETprograms and commu-
nityor business needs were often inappropriate or nonexistent; and many
VETcurricula werepoorly designed (World Bank, 1991: 71ff). As a result, the
World Bank increased educational investments in primary education and gen-
eral secondary education and simultaneously reconfigured its support for VET
54
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
Table 3: World Bank Investments in Vocational and Technical
Education and Training, 1963–1988
Period 1963–1976 1977–1988
Total amount invested
(in constant millions U.S. dollars) 969 4399
Average yearly amount invested
(in constant millions U.S. dollars) 69.2 366.6
Target of VET Investment (%) 100 100
Secondary diversified schools 28 2
Secondary vocational schools 26 18
Postsecondary vocational schools 21 24
Non-formal education 26 56
Source: Adapted from World Bank (1991), p. 66.
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
55
projects to those that were increasingly privatized, concentrated at the post-
secondary level, and more closely linked to specific industrial sectors and skill
demands (World Bank, 1991). Since the 1970s, and more intensively during
the past decade, UNESCO has also actively promoted technical and vocational
education, through initiatives such as the International Project on Technical
and Vocational Education (UNEVOC), various reports and international meet-
ings
13
and the establishment of an International Center in Bonn (2000).
The controversy over vocational education and training—whether it
should be conceived as curricular diversification in general secondary schools,
as separate schools training students for labor market positions, as a broad
educational strategy to inculcate job-relevant or life-related skills among
young people, or as non-formal frameworks providing status-enhancing skills
to out-of-school youth—continues unabated (Lillis and Hogan, 1983;
Psacharopoulos, 1987, 1990; Gill et al., 2000). Social scientists have raised dif-
ficult questions about the effectiveness and efficiency of VET programs in
developing countries: Can national policy makers accurately predict changing
labor market structures, manpower requirements, and occupational skill
demands in order to tighten the links between educational programs and
labor markets? Can relevant VET curricula be designed and can qualified
teachers be trained and employed? Can the governments of developing coun-
tries afford the higher costs and outlays associated with VET programs, espe-
cially under conditions of austerity? Do employers actually prefer VET gradu-
ates to general education graduates? Can educational programs, by
themselves, alter economic structures and patterns of unemployment or
underemployment? Based on findings from accumulated researchconducted
over recent decades, thereis little evidence of unequivocal, affirmative
responses to these questions (see Lewin, 1993; Tillak, 2002).In the wakeof
many failed VET reforms, the relative effectiveness of VET programs seems to
depend on relatively scarce and highly contingent conditions being met, such
as a country’slevel of development, clear linkages with existing labor markets,
institutional configurations of the national education system, the qualityof
teacher training,and employer preferences.
Furthermore, as previously discussed, the bias towards academic studies
and the perception that vocational education entails an inferior, “second-
class” education have deep historical roots in postcolonial states. The intro-
duction of formal school structures during the colonial period significantly
affected social-class formation, conceptions of “modernization,” and defini-
tions of what counts as valid knowledge and, consequently, valid schooling
(Lillis and Hogan, 1983). In many settings, colonial experiences created
strong biases and negative attitudes towards vocational education (Beckford,
1972; Abdulah, 198l; Rabo, 1986). Although elite secondary education seemed
to contradict the populist, democratic spirit of newly independent nations,
13. In Seoul, Korea, the Second International Congress on Technical and Vocational
Education was held in 1999. In Moscow, Russia, An Expert Meeting on Information and
Communication Technologies in Technical and Vocational Education and Training was
held in 2002.
many older elites who had been educated in colonial systems viewed the
vocationalization of secondary education as eroding academic standards
(Sutton, 1965: 75). In addition, those in power were disinclined to dismantle
education systems that privileged their children’s achievements and futures
(Heyneman, 1971). Although government functionaries may have been will-
ing to pay lip service to practical skill training or revitalized agricultural edu-
cation, they continued to support regressive policies favoring higher educa-
tion. This orientation towards the elite resulted in persistent educational
inequalities (Gauhar, 1981; Khan, 1981).
Formative historical experiences molded public conceptions of appropri-
ate or inappropriate education. For example, Caribbean countries were over-
whelmingly partial to a grammar-school-type education and correspondingly
averse to technical education, reflecting attitudes consistent with their British
heritage and related to their slavery experience (Lewis and Lewis, 1985: 35).
Only when the public (especially parents) became critical of the high failure
rates of children in the traditional academic curriculum did some govern-
ments initiate programmatic changes to secondary education (Lewis and
Lewis, 1985).Vocational-school leavers expected to gain access to more high-
ly-skilled positions in the labor market. When governments’ manpower fore-
casts went unrealized, support for VET programs eroded and interest in aca-
demic programs, which seemed a more promising road to stable wage
employment, increased. Indeed, the factthat VET programs rarely altered
existing employment structures explains in part the qualified and shifting
support they received.
In sum, despite the vocational-school fallacyand the many problems asso-
ciated with VET programs, national and international interest in vocational
education remains quite strong. Policies favoring some form of vocationaliza-
tion have a simple, intuitive logic to them, and they continue to garner finan-
cial support—albeit morenarrowly targeted—by donor organizations and
host governments (World Bank, 1991; Gill et al., 2000).Over the course of
the twentieth century,visions of vocational education have invented and re-
invented themselves on numerous occasions.They continue to imbue inter-
national policy discussions, particularly those that consider the transforma-
tion of secondary school systems in less-developed countries (World Bank,
2005). Under very specific economic and institutional conditions, some VET
programs became an integral feature of formal secondary schooling. The his-
torical evidence suggests, however, that such programs are being radically
transformed. They are less frequently organized around particular jobs and
vocations and more often around different types of skill training, increasingly
anchored at the upper- and post-secondary levels, increasingly funded by pri-
vate sources and conducted outside the public education system, and increas-
ingly defined as in-career, rather than pre-career, training. More so than other
forms of schooling, cultural orientations and historical legacies have played,
and continue to play, a significant role in determining the legitimacy and
place of vocational education in postcolonial states.
56
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
57
The Experience of Communist Countries
Unlike most western countries, where major educational transitions resulted
from complex and drawn-out historical processes, communist countries often
imposed decisive educational reforms in the wake of successful regime
change. Newly established socialist governments—including the Soviet
Union during the 1920s, China from the late 1950s to the mid-1970s, and
Cuba from 1960 to the early 1970s—were deeply committed to educational
expansion as well as the promotion of adult literacy through mass campaigns
(Bhola, 1984; Arnove and Graff, 1987). Revolutionary leaders “attributed
great importance to education as part of the means of achieving social trans-
formation” (Carnoy and Samoff, 1990: 7).
Each of these regimes established new educational frameworks intended
to blur the traditional hierarchy between academic and professional studies as
well as the separation between school life and the work world. Soviet “facto-
ry-run schools and school-run factories” and Chinese work-study programs
that encouraged individuals to “work every day and study every day” exem-
plified the integration of education and labor. In Cuba, academic studies
became more utilitarian in character. China highlighted science and technolo-
gy subjects, especially their application outside the classroom, often carrying
out lessons at factories and farm sites (Cheng and Manning, 2003). The poly-
technical model, established in the late 1950s and 1960s in the Soviet Union
and Eastern Europe, forged new links between school and work by integrat-
ing general and vocational education at a national level. At the upper-second-
ary level, schools sought to strike a balance between theoretical knowledge
and practical training in production (UNESCO,1961: 139–140).
Many of these educational reforms were abruptly reversed in the wake of
unmet economic goals and objectives. In the 1930s, the Soviet Union passed a
series of decrees that restored aspects of the previous system with the aim of
more effectively training technicians, engineers, and administrators. After
Mao’s death in 1976, Chinese leaders reintroduced college admission examina-
tions and reestablished “key [elite] schools” in every province and city. In
Cuba in 1970, weak levels of sugar production—a major economic target of
the revolution—led Castro to launch educational reforms stressing grades, dis-
cipline, and promotion, thereby undercutting previous initiatives to integrate
work and study.In the early 1980s, the establishment of a new elite school sys-
tem called the School for Exact Sciences launched Cuba’s “battle for quality”
(Cheng and Manning,2003). Although leaders abandoned many ambitious
educational experiments, communist education systems continued to be
inspired by egalitarian ideals and to emphasize technological and scientific
study.
Cuba is considered an especially successful example of educational trans-
formation under socialism. According to Padula and Smith, “the revolutionary
reforms of Cuban education from 1959–1987…rank as one of the more extraor-
dinary efforts in the history of education” (1988: 135). Education and educa-
tional change became a symbol of the revolution itself; mass education became
ameans of economic participation and mobilization (Carnoy 1990: 171).
Cuba’s impressive educational achievements include: universal school enroll-
ment and attendance; comprehensive early childhood education and student
health programs; equality of basic educational opportunity, both rural and
urban and even in impoverished areas; extensive pre- and in-service training of
teachers, who also enjoy relatively high professional status; near-universal
adult literacy; expanded non-formal programs for out-of-school youth and
adults; and a strong scientific training base (Gasparini, 2000).
Discussion of Cuban educational reform should be framed by two main
factors that contributed to its success: the positive influence of certain pre-
revolutionary conditions such as relatively high adult literacy rates and a well-
organized and educated labor force; and the comprehensive manner in which
authorities confronted educational and non-educational problems.
Specifically, initiatives sought simultaneously to substantially reduce poverty
(Berube, 1984), eliminate adult illiteracy, improve children’s health care,
increase access to primary and lower-secondary education, raise teachers’ sta-
tus, involve parents and community leaders in school affairs, and bring about
important curricular reforms. In addition, community motivation remained
strong and was nourished constantly by the politics of mass mobilization.
Recent comparative analyses of mathematics and language achievement
among Latin American pupils illustrate the strong performance of Cuban
pupils (Willms and Somers, 2001; Carnoy and Marshall, 2005).Indeed, many
of Cuba’sschools perform at levels similar to those of OECD countries
(Gasparini, 2000).
In addition to the aforementioned factors, many scholars discuss how
Cuba’sstate structures and politics have contributed to the outstanding results
of its educational system (Carnoy,1990; Torres, 1991; Carnoy and Marshall,
2005). First, the highly structured educational system depends on a centralized
educational administration, whichsets national educational policies.Indeed,
muchpolitical decision making in Cuba is personalistic. Second, the continu-
ityof education strategies has benefited from the stabilityof political policies
over several decades.Third, levels of investment in education have remained
high, even during periods of severe resource constraint (Gasparini, 2000).
Lastly, community participation in school management has been encouraged,
as have parent and student involvement in curriculum reform. Although it is
unlikely to be replicated in full, many aspects of Cuba’s educational revolution
should be carefully considered by other countries that are working to expand
and improve their educational systems (MacDonald, 1985).
Conclusion
Concern for equality and equity was not an integral part of the early evolu-
tion of national education systems. For centuries, elite education was the
norm. Debate in most of Europe and North America initially revolved
around the educability of the children of the masses and whether they should
be incorporated as citizens in the nascent nation-state through their participa-
tion in public schooling. Only in the late nineteenth and early twentieth cen-
58
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
59
turies did the discourse shift from a question of exclusion and inclusion, to a
question of the terms of inclusion. In other words, although it was generally
accepted that all children should be educated, the debate was over how much
schooling, at what ages, and with what objectives and contents in mind
(Ramirez, 2003). Even as discourses changed slowly and unevenly, educa-
tional realities lagged further behind.
In European colonies and postcolonial states, the issue of whether all chil-
dren are educable, or need be educated, remained salient well into the twenti-
eth century. In this sense, the educational principles discussed at the
International Conferences on Public Education during the inter-War period
(Magnin, 2002) and later institutionalized in the UN’s Universal Declaration
of Human Rights (1948) represented dramatic turning points for children liv-
ing in dependent territories and former colonies. The idea of free and univer-
sal primary education, however elusive its implementation may have been in
practice, effectively placed all children of school age into a single category of
comparison, in which measures of educational inequalities could be con-
structed, evaluated, and transformed into objects of policy reform.
As we have seen, secondaryeducation was historically limited in coverage,
relatively uniform in structure, and academic in content. Calls to open sec-
ondaryschools to children from less-privileged backgrounds, and to diversify
its traditional purposes, invoked different principles and confronted different
realities around the world. The high-status knowledge and elite cultural
codes associated with academic secondaryschools weredeeply ingrained in
European history,less so in North America. Many Europeans believed that
children of popular origin wereincapable of meeting the difficult challenges
of academic studies in grammar schools, lycées, and gymnasiums.Expanding
access to secondaryeducation meant lowering academic standards.Critics
cited the less-than-rigorous demands of American high schools and colleges,
in contrast to European ones, as the price of mass secondaryeducation
(Resnik, 2001).Moreover,industrial economies demanded morescientists,
technicians, and skilled workers. Policies expanding vocational and techno-
logical education, on the one hand, and increasing the scientific and techno-
logical content of general education, on the other, more effectively addressed
the alarming lack of such workers. Thus, to the extent that countries champi-
oned policies to increase access to secondary education, they typically
advanced these policies within a hierarchical framework of stratified schools
and programs of study.
The principle of equality of opportunity and the democratization of sec-
ondary education slowly gained momentum in postwar Europe. With high
economic growth rates and relatively activist regimes, many European gov-
ernments inaugurated radical reforms in secondary education: reconfiguring
selection criteria, extending compulsory education, establishing clearer mark-
ers between lower- and upper-secondary education, transforming vocational
education, diversifying curricula, and expanding comprehensive schools. As
we have discussed, the evolution towards more democratic secondary educa-
tion systems involved complex interactions of technological changes, political
cultures, educational standards, and cultural and social traditions. In newly
independent states, intergovernmental organizations and Western experts
played an important role in fostering these new conceptions of education.
By the late 1970s, visions of a more democratic and egalitarian secondary-
school sector began to fade. The energy crisis and economic stagnation left
egalitarian targets unfulfilled. Notions of equity—a justice-laden concept—
began to replace those of equality in educational discourse. Equity-based
analyses sought to understand why, despite the seemingly good intentions of
educators and planners, education systems continued to produce disappoint-
ing results. Equity discourse in Western countries conceptualized and engen-
dered new target groups, such as immigrant children, marginalized popula-
tions, and disabled pupils. In international organizations, this discourse
addressed indigenous peoples, rural populations, minority groups, and, espe-
cially, girls (Chabbott, 2003: 57).
From the mid-1980s, an economic world-competition discourse gradually
replaced the economic growth discourse. Shifts in economic and demograph-
ic conditions yielded new challenges for education systems in more-devel-
oped and less-developed countries alike. There was a pressing need to
increase general educational levels in the population, to improve vocational
education and skill training, and to provide a solid basis for lifelong learning.
Recommendations addressing these challenges were coupled with strategies
to reduce education costs, improve efficiency,increase private sector interven-
tion, and decentralize educational governance. As education was increasingly
linked to global production needs and the activities of the private sector,
many contended that the neoliberal discourse of the New Right had become
the dominant model (Kallaway,1989). Policies endorsed by the World Bank
sought to advance these principles without contradicting equityprinciples.
Actions to improve skills training (e.g., macroeconomic strategies, more
effective and efficient private sector training,improvements to public skill
training) wereexpected to address equityobjectives for the poor and the
socially disadvantaged (World Bank, 1991: 17–21).In sum, this new valorizing
concept of manual skills permitted the bridging of demands for universal sec-
ondary education, more diversified secondary education serving increasingly
heterogeneous populations, and the perceived economic imperatives that jus-
tify vocational and technical education (Resnik, 2001).
INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS AND THE
INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF THE GLOBAL EDUCATION SYSTEM
Our comparative analytical historyof mass schooling has highlighted the
influence of transnational and international processes.Wecontend that the
circulation and emulation of foreign educational models arenot recent inven-
tions.Rather,what has changed over time is the natureof educational knowl-
edge being discussed and transferred.
The observation and selective borrowing of foreign educational practices
has been an integral part of the movement towards compulsorymass educa-
60
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
61
tion. Scholars interested in new pedagogical approaches, such as that of
Pestalozzi (1746–1827), traveled considerable distances to study emergent
practices in the eighteenth century. Foreign advisers and educational experts,
who served as emissaries of their national governments, came to study the
Prussian education system in order to transfer educational knowledge to their
countries (Noah and Eckstein, 1969; Cummings, 1980, 1997). From
1830–1850, prominent Americans such as C. Woodbridge and Horace Mann
traveled to Western Europe to observe and compare school organization and
educational frameworks (Knight, 1955; Fraser, 1969: 1–17). After World War I,
John Dewey wrote extensive surveys on prominent educational approaches
and practices in Soviet Russia, China, Mexico, and Turkey (Dewey, 1964).
The advent of governmental statistical offices in Europe and North
America during the nineteenth century (Desrosières, 1998) contributed to the
circulation of more thorough accounts of foreign educational frameworks
and heralded the emergence of a world education system (Schriewer, 2000)
or world culture (Chabbott, 2003), which expanded rapidly in the twentieth
century. Although some studies dealing with education had been carried out
by the International Labour Organization prior to the founding of the IBE in
1925, the IBE sought to transform children’s education into a scientific field
(Magnin, 2002).Beginning in the 1930s, the IBE-sponsored International
Conference on [Public] Education brought together leading education pro-
ponents and senior officials of ministries of education from around the
world. The recommendations of this international forum, whichboth sym-
bolized and contributed to the growing global education system, “…consti-
tute[d] a kind of international charter or code of public education, a body of
educational doctrine of verywide scope and importance” (from the IBE web-
site, accessed June 2003).
Undoubtedly,the establishment of UNESCO after World War II proved to
be the most important turning point in the development of this global sys-
tem (Meyer and Ramirez, 2000; Chabbott, 2003).In addition to its legitima-
cyas part of the UN system, UNESCO’sburgeoning educational agenda was
instilled with an unprecedented universalistic moral authority.Education sys-
tems around the world came to be considered part of an all-encompassing
global framework in which individual units could examine and adapt
“proven” or promising educational practices. Beginning in the 1950s,
UNESCO launched comparative educational reports, international meetings,
and policy declarations, which invested it with further international authority
and caused many member states to seriously consider and subsequently apply
its recommendations. In addition to UNESCO,intergovernmental organiza-
tions such as the World Bank and OECD became salient channels for the glob-
al diffusion of Western standards and educational models through their
research reports, policy statements, and project funding. The activities of
these organizations resulted in the greater uniformity of educational accounts,
aprocess that has intensified over time (Resnik, 2006b).
The attractiveness of the American educational model also contributed to
the adoption of standardized educational recommendations in many interna-
tional organizations in two significant ways. First, in the aftermath of World
War II, the United States emerged as the triumphant superpower and took
the lead in a range of economic, political, and cultural arenas. The Allies’ vic-
tory brought attention to American educational structures and practices, as
well as their presumed high technological standards. European scholars were
encouraged to travel to U.S. universities in order to absorb ideas from the
“New World.” Many countries became interested in imitating certain aspects
of the American system and in becoming part of global educational networks
in which the United States was a central actor (see Paulston, 1968: 100;
Hoffman, 1997). Second, the United States was deeply involved in European
reconstruction through aid programs, notably the Marshall Plan, and the cir-
culation of professional experts. In the early years after the establishment of
UNESCO,Americans held many high-status jobs in the organization. They
shaped UNESCO’s visions, objectives, and work methods and exposed
European leaders cooperating in international organizations (mainly
UNESCO,the World Bank, and OECD)to the democratic, egalitarian, and util-
itarian worldview dominant in the United States (Pendergast, 1974: 171).
The formation of a global education system and the uniformization of
education systems should not be attributed exclusively to pro-U.S. tendencies
and American leadership in international organizations. During the First
Development Decade (1950–1960) and the Second Development Decade
(1960–1970) an “education for development” discourse was constructed in
international organizations (Chabbott, 2003: 42–5).The adoption of this
“education–economic growth” blackbox (to use Latour’s1987 term) in inter-
national organizations legitimized the empowerment and enlargement of its
education departments (Resnik, 2006b). From the late 1950s until the early
1970s, economic growth and modernization theoryheld the arena and influ-
enced the much of the development thinking of international aid agencies in
Europe and North America(Watson, 1984a: 1).Once the United Nations
embraced the notion that education is a key factor to economic growth, the
idea rapidly gained popularityin international forums and among interna-
tional policyanalysts.The “education–economic growth” black box was per-
ceived as an effective means to accomplish the primary aims of the OECD and
UNESCO—that is, to promote the coordination of states, international com-
parisons, and the global interchange of information among member states.
Departments of education in international organizations expanded and their
staffs advised and coordinated immense international agendas in both more-
and less-developed countries. Member states were expected to increase their
educational budgets and were mandated to improve the educational levels of
the population. Attempts to realize all these resolutions and recommenda-
tions led to the creation of an “education–economic growth” global network
(Resnik, 2006b).
The worldwide network encompassed a long list of researchers, econo-
mists of education, and planning experts, and recruitment of these individu-
als intensified. The number of functionaries dealing with educational issues
increased considerably in most countries. The global network included many
62
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
63
institutions: departments of educational statistics and of educational plan-
ning were established in many countries; study groups on education and eco-
nomic development were organized by UNESCO and OECD;international
institutes for promoting education were founded (such as UNESCO’s Institute
of Education and the International Institute of Educational Planning [IIEP])
or renewed (such as the IBE); comparative scientific educational journals pro-
liferated; and international education forums, such as the IEA (International
Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement) were founded.
This world educational apparatus, in which education units within interna-
tional organizations were central actors, launched a global campaign impos-
ing Western educational models, in both Europe and in developing countries
(Resnik, 2006b).
The faith in economic growth resulting from educational expansion
began to fade in the early 1970s (Weiler, 1978; Blakemore and Cooksey, 1981:
281; Fry, 1981). Nevertheless, the adoption of the “education–economic
growth” black box in the 1960s had already resulted in a remarkable expan-
sion of education systems through the world. More important, it resulted in
the establishment of a global educational apparatus which included, among
other things, comparative education reviews and institutions, planning insti-
tutions, national institutes of statistics, newly created educational research
centers, and partnerships with social sciences and educational sciences at the
universities.As the densityof interactions among these entities grew,so too
did the standardization of global education descriptions.The uniformization
of the global education discourse influenced educational planning,and trans-
formed educational sciences into comparative and applied sciences (Resnik,
2006a).Thus, the global education apparatus developed around techniques
of standardized statistics, planning,educational applied research, and com-
parative education. As Daston claims, “statistics do not just describe the
world, they change it” (2000: 35).In the 1970s, the ideals of the
“education–economic growth” blackbox, whichhad propelled the construc-
tion of this enormous educational machine, began to vanish, but the global
education system was already widely recognized and institutionalized.
The 1950s and the 1960s were conceived as the golden age of education
(Papadopulous, 1994: 37). But, in the mid-1970s, the educational discourse in
international agencies began to change as a result of economic problems
caused by the energy crisis. Reductions in educational expenditures forced
developed countries to manage their resources more efficiently and effective-
ly. These countries developed new indices to monitor their education systems
and reduce costs. Donor countries were less eager to collaborate with costly
development projects. In less-developed countries, this resulted in cutoffs of
international educational funding and in recommendations from internation-
al agencies to apply efficiency and effectiveness norms to their educational
administrations. Moreover, in the 1980s, the debts crisis and the introduction
of World Bank and IMF Structural Adjustment programs forced indebted
developing countries to reduce their expenditures in education. Decentral-
ization and local educational governance became keystones of international
discourse, mainly in the World Bank, as a way to grapple with bloated and
inefficient central administrations and to encourage greater community
financing of local schools (Kiernan, 2000; Chabbott, 2003: 56). Renewed
faith in market forces, skepticism about state efficiency in providing social
services, and the search for strategies that would enlarge local control and
financing led many donor institutions to favor NGOsas social service delivery
agents, increasing NGO participation in educational projects (Chabbott,
2003: 46). In the 1990s, the introduction of the Human Development Index
renewed interest in “human resources development,” emphasizing the need
to increase the participation of girls and minority children in the education
system (Chabbott, 2003: 56–57).
In some international organizations, the drive for educational expansion
languished over time. As Chabbott (2003: 62) notes, international discourse
in the last decade of the twentieth century increasingly privileged individual
welfare over national growth as the more appropriate measure of develop-
ment. In other organizations, notably the World Bank, where investments in
educational projects grew, faith in education was transformed. No longer
simply an engine of economic growth, education became a means of reduc-
ing povertyand promoting sustainable development. At UNESCO,where
notions of education as a fundamental human right dominated, ambitious
large-scale programs to enhance all forms of education were undertaken. The
Education for All (EFA)movement, initially launched by UNESCO and other
international organizations during the World Education Conference in
Jomtien (Thailand) in 1990, placed basic education high on the development
agenda. A decade later in Dakar (Senegal), representatives from over 160
countries and NGOs reaffirmed their commitment to EFA,and generated a
moredetailed set of goals, actions, and monitoring mechanisms for achieving
educational targets over the coming decades.
In summary,international discourse on education, in both governmental
and nongovernmental organizations, changed substantially over the past four
decades.During the 1960s and 1970s, Education for All, Universal Primary
Education (UPE),Compulsoryand Free Education, and Education for Self
Reliance became the rallying cries for governments and donors alike. The
World Bank initially emphasized the needs of tertiary education and later
highlighted projects that vocationalized secondary education. In the 1970s,
the Basic Needs philosophy affected the way in which educational projects
and reforms were perceived, while in the 1980s, the Structural Adjustment
Programs (SAPs) became the frame through which donor investments in edu-
cation were evaluated (Kiernan, 2000). The notion of economic growth
transformed into economic development; concepts like the “pool of abilities”
or equality of oppportunity virtually disappeared from international dis-
course. The education of minority groups, the cultural rights of aborigines,
gender equality and parity, and the emergence of the all-encompassing
knowledge society became new themes in international policy papers. Earlier
educational recommendations morphed into newer ones—almost all became
integrated into world educational culture. Unchanged, however, was the
64
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
65
power to initiate, diffuse, and adapt educational discourses, which remained
unequal. The adoption of education recommendations, typically formulated
in the developed world for international circulation, strongly revolved
around national and local considerations in more-industrialized countries. In
less-developed countries, by contrast, national contingencies and local condi-
tions took a back seat to the prospect of international aid, thereby reducing
degrees of political freedom in adapting recommended reforms.
WHAT CAN BE LEARNED FROM A COMPARATIVE
SOCIO-HISTORICAL ANALYSIS OF UNIVERSAL EDUCATION?
The historical development of universal basic education was an uneven and
highly contingent process.
The development of universal basic education—compulsory, systemic, inte-
grated, inclusive, diversified, and attuned to discourses advanced by interna-
tional agencies—was an uneven and highly contingent historical process.
This is a major point arising from the comparative socio-historical analysis
undertaken in this paper. The evolution of public systems of primary and sec-
ondaryschools depended, in different times and places, on changing configu-
rations of local, national, regional, and global conditions. In Europe and
North America, state structures and processes of state formation profoundly
affected educational expansion and systemization. Late industrializers often
linked educational expansion to economic and technological development,
and moved morequickly to develop vocational-education frameworks for
children destined for positions in industryand manufacturing.In societies
with weak aristocratic traditions and less elitist cultural conceptions, there
weremoredetermined efforts to prolong compulsoryschooling and to
expand and diversifysecondaryeducation. Compulsorymass schooling
emerged from diverse social, economic, and political conditions.In some
cases, it invoked nation-building processes and new conceptions of citizen-
ship; in others, it was informed by long-standing conflicts with powerful reli-
gious authorities and by social movements supporting secularization; and in
still others, it served to weaken the pervasiveness of child labor and gender
discrimination.
In Asia, Africa, and Latin America, indigenous educational forms had
important historical consequences, not only during the period of European
imperialism, but also following political independence. The structures, prin-
ciples, and practices predominating in colonial and missionary schools also
left indelible marks on mass education in postcolonial states. Indigenous cul-
tural authorities and foreign actors stimulated distinctive historical legacies,
from the varying predominance of ideologies of educational exclusion to the
passage and enforcement of educational ordinances, from the strategies used
to address religious and private schools to those used to reform of secondary
education. Furthermore, transnational and international forces profoundly
influenced the development of universal education in newly independent
countries. More so than in Europe and North America, in which selective
(but limited) cultural borrowing took place, intergovernmental organizations
not only circulated prevailing educational models, but also pressured national
elites to adopt them. Crucial changes to mass education in these regions
depended, in no small measure, on such exogenous forces.
Comparative historical scholarship of the emergence, systemization, and
expansion of universal education remains underdeveloped and downplays the
diverse origins and meanings of mass schooling.
Even within the narrow confines of the issues addressed in this paper, there is
an acute need for existing social scientific scholarship to reconsider and
reevaluate existing studies of the origins and development of mass education.
The overemphasis on comparative (usually quantitative) studies of enroll-
ment expansion and isomorphic tendencies has resulted in scholars ignoring
or downgrading other aspects of the historical institutionalization of univer-
sal education, which is much more diverse and heterogeneous in nature than
typically characterized. It is time for comparative researchers to admit long-
standing biases in what has (and has not) been studied and to launchnew
comparative historical studies of mass education, which would extend and
enrichthe conceptual models that have become accepted truths.
The models, policies, and recommendations of international actors and
organizations were de-contextualized from their historical roots.
Another key point to emerge from the comparative analyses in this paper
concerns the problematic flow of Western educational models and practices
across space and time. Educational structures in the West resulted from his-
torically diverse national conditions and extensive political debates.In con-
trast, policies and practices prescribed by transnational agents for developing
countries showed relative uniformityand little adaptation to local contexts.
Transnational agents often presented these policies as quicksolutions to
pressing social and economic problems.The educational models flowing to
postcolonial states were, by their verynature, de-contextualized. Because
these models relied upon research findings framed within Western problema-
tiques and embedded in the institutional configurations of dominant educa-
tion systems, they lacked an in-depth understanding of the contexts in which
they were proffered and transplanted. As Foster (1977) notes, concepts such
as social stratification, created to analyze patterns in Western societies, can be
misleading if applied uncritically to the non-Western world. Or as Hirschman
(1968) points out, modernization theorists institutionalized a model of the
development process that was divorced from history and the distinctive fea-
tures of particular nation-states. Indeed, international educational policies
and reforms are rarely grounded in historical configurations.
The longstanding controversy over academic (general) versus vocational
(technical) secondary education aptly illustrates the problem of de-contextu-
alization created when exogenous educational models are applied to less-
developed countries. In case after case, government initiatives and support
66
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
67
for vocational education and training overlooked generic problems and basic
fallacies related to the vocational education–employment nexus. These prob-
lems included critical public perceptions, poorly trained teachers, outdated
facilities, few student incentives, and a paucity of data on actual or future
manpower needs (Chapman and Windham, 1985). Vocationalization policies
encapsulated a seemingly intuitive logic, which made them attractive to both
donor organizations and host governments. Although research indicated that
the success of VET was highly context-dependent, it continued to be circulat-
ed as a legitimate and attractive policy alternative within a simplified, de-con-
textualized model.
Another example of this phenomenon can be seen in international recom-
mendations that called on Latin American countries to dismantle the grasp of
the federal government or central state over educational provisions. In the
1980s, when such decentralization reforms were implemented in Argentina and
Chile, neither greater efficiency nor equity resulted. Instead, private enroll-
ments and socioeconomic segmentation increased (Narodowski and Nores,
2002).As Braslavsky and Gvirtz (2000) contend, decentralization proposals
and similar recommendations suchas vouchers and school autonomy were
conceived in Anglo-Saxon cultures, which could draw upon rich historical
experiences of local administration of education prior to reforms. Advocates of
decentralization ignored the absence of these experiences in Latin America and
minimized the legacyof regressive, elite-driven purposes that school systems
had historically served. The adoption of decentralization reforms made a diffi-
cult situation even worse, and exacerbated deeply rooted social inequalities.
In short, for prescriptive international policies to thrive, they must con-
sider the richly diverse economic, social, and political contexts in whichedu-
cation systems areembedded (Fagerlind and Saha, 1983: viii).
Religion, cultural diversity, and local institutions are often neglected in
policy recommendations.
The educational proposals of international agencies seldom touchupon top-
ics related to cultural patterns and religious traditions, whichfurther con-
tributes to their de-contextualized nature. This restraint might be rational-
ized in relation to Latin America, owing to its shared Christian traditions and
extensive Western influence, but it proves problematic in non-Western states
and Muslim societies. The suggestion that educational “best practices” can be
transferred indiscriminately from one cultural context to another illustrates
the widespread inattention to the cultural grounding of educational policies
and processes. In Africa, for example, the roles played by languages of
instruction, by indigenous philosophy or gnosis, and by the community in
the education of its youth, are scarcely considered in proposals for education-
al reform (Mudimbe, 1988). Treating these issues as unimportant for the edu-
cation of African children miseducates, rather than educates, for personal,
national, and continental development (Jagusah, 2001).
Many scholars see the adoption of de-contextualized education models as
disruptive for their societies. Incorporating implicit Western values through
schooling without taking into account indigenous values can prove unpro-
ductive and risky in the long run. For example, in Ethiopia, modern schools
produced “culturally displaced” individuals who felt at home neither in their
own culture nor in the imported foreign culture (Germa, 1982). Schools cul-
tivated scientific attitudes, taught democratic institutions, and transmitted
egalitarian values for an imagined society, even though realities on the
ground remained prescientific, authoritarian, and hierarchical. According to
Saqib (1981: 51), the injection of occidental values and lifestyles, mainly
through haphazard importation of technology, runs counter to the values
promoted by Islam and undermines the morale of their people.
Indigenous African traditions tend to emphasize collectivist orientations
rather than individualistic ones (Mazrui and Wagaw, 1985). Patterns of African
socialization and training are meant to reflect the values, wisdom, and expecta-
tions of the community and wider society. Western forms of schooling, which
stress the “intellectual” development of the individual, have been less attentive
to community needs, goals, and expectations. Knowledge of the rational,
intellectual, and philosophical sciences may be an optional element for a
Muslim; knowledge of the religious sciences is obligatory because it is
“absolutely essential for man’sguidance and salvation” (Naquib al-Attas, 1991:
40). By exclusively focusing on modern secular schooling, policy analysts neg-
lect the potential contributions of Muslim forms of education to national pur-
poses (Fisher,1969).Despite the centralityof religion in many Muslim
nations, educational strategies advanced by Western experts only reluctantly
discuss the role of religious studies.Creative accommodations of religious and
secular studies—or the lackthereof—mayinfluence parents’ willingness to
enroll their children, especially girl children, in “modern schools.”
Many experts in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia do not believe that the
solution to this dilemma lies in abandoning one form of education (indige-
nous or religious) for another (modern). Public schooling can play a vital
societal role if it addresses the cultural, social, and moral challenges, not just
political and economic ones, facing local communities.Some scholars refer to
this as creating a moredomesticated or indigenized education system. For
this reason, scholars and policy makers need to become familiar with the his-
torical evolution and contemporary patterns of indigenous education (Bray
et al., 1986: 109; Kelly, 2000). In today’s multicultural world, a familiarity
with both religious and cultural sensibilities and practices, as well as a consid-
eration of ways to incorporate indigenous institutions within educational
reform strategies, has considerable relevance.
Political actors and processes,as well as local economic institutions,are
disregarded in international educational programs.
In the early 1970s, Heyneman (1971) argued that intergovernmental organiza-
tions seldom consider political factors in their recommendations—an argu-
ment that is still germane today. Two types of arguments have dominated
international reforms, the adaptation and the empirical. The adaptation argu-
ment assumes that human nature is social and cooperative, and that the state,
68
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
69
party, and nation are logical tools employed by individuals to construct socie-
ty. The empirical argument is deeply rooted in economic perspectives, which
assume the primacy of individual motives and regard the state as neither the
most efficient planner nor the best educator (Heyneman, 1971: 7). Both
approaches underestimate (or disregard) political considerations and the role
of political elites in educational processes, especially in less-developed coun-
tries. What and how schools teach, and which children have access to existing
learning opportunities, are, in essence, the outcomes of political processes
that involve multiple, often conflicting, actors and interest groups. Moreover,
political attitudes and positions are likely to be decoupled from actual educa-
tional targets (Meyer and Rowan, 1977). National administrations may agree
to pursue major educational reforms, sometimes based on recommendations
of international agencies, but then dispense with effective implementation
mechanisms. Indeed, in less-developed regions, the scarcity of resources and
the enormous gap between the socioeconomic statuses of the educated and
the uneducated turn any educational reform into a contested political issue.
Another problematic aspect of the de-contextualized policies proffered to
less-developed countries, especially in Asia and Africa, is the disregard of (or
inattention to) political outcomes, in contrast to ever-present economic ones.
As we have seen, state building and re-conceptions of citizenship played cru-
cial roles in the history of early national education systems. Coleman (1965:
53) argues that these tasks areno less important for the education systems of
newly independent nations. Political integration and nurturing a political
identityin the young areessential conditions for national unityand the via-
bilityand legitimacyof political institutions.The construction and preserva-
tion of a nation, or a national polity,depend on effective frameworks of
socialization. Nevertheless, the educational agendas of international organi-
zations rarely explicate linkages between specific educational polices or prac-
tices—for example, languages of instruction or languages taught (Perren,
1969)—and political outcomes suchas nation building,political democratiza-
tion, or national solidarity.
The absence of the political can also be seen in the neglectof salient politi-
cal differences. International policies may focus on a particular geopolitical
region, like Sub-Saharan Africa, and then minimize political differences, both
past and present, and assume commonalities. Abdi (2003), for example,
shows that variation in the political histories of Somalia, South Africa, and
Nigeria differentially affected educational structures and outcomes (e.g.,
brain drain). Programs for African education and development, which often
lack refinement in these matters, tend to suggest common solutions to the
complex educational problems they address. Later, when policies fail, politi-
cal explanations (e.g., party infighting, corruption) are advanced to rational-
ize lost educational opportunities.
Notwithstanding the deep belief in the power of education, Heyneman
(1971: 110) argues that it is misleading to assume that schools can be the sole
agents of social and political change, or even the prime movers of economic
and agricultural development. Schools alone are unable to produce wide-
spread changes in rural life. They become effective only when they are part of
abroader economic and social plan to make farming more productive
(Griffiths, 1965, cited in Heyneman, 1971). As we have seen, vocational educa-
tion programs or prevocational courses have little influence on local markets
and employment conditions. Educational expansion, which produces un-,
under-, and mis-employed school graduates, may unintentionally increase
social tensions and political instability. In Ethiopia, for instance, the 1974 rev-
olution was spearheaded by disillusioned students who felt uncertain about
their future, by young military officers who joined the army after failing at
school, by dissatisfied teachers, and by a large number of semi-educated
young dropouts (Germa, 1982). In short, when educational reforms are treat-
ed in isolation from associated changes in economic and political organiza-
tion, they are unlikely to bring about real social and economic progress.
International educational models are often inadequate and irrelevant
in local context.
This paper has shown that international agencies, whichact as independent
initiators or catalysts of educational policies and models, shift the foci of their
policies according to changing logics and imperatives divorced from local
considerations.In the early 1970s, agency interest shifted from higher educa-
tion to elementary education. Later, there was a change in emphasis from
models based on formal education to those based on non-formal education,
whichstimulated an unprecedented number of studies and projects on non-
formal learning supported by the World Bank and UNESCO.Nowadays, inter-
national agencies emphasize strategies that integrate school-based and out-of-
school learning under the heading of “basic education” or lifelong learning
(Brayet al., 1986: 16).
Under conditions of economic dependency,however,the abilityof
nations to select or adapt educational models is circumscribed. Poor or
deeply indebted countries tend to be highly solicitous of aid, grants, loans, or
technical assistance from international donors.In order to receive aid and to
signal that they are responsible and rational actors, economically weak states
construct “frameworks for action,” which are consistent with international
agendas (Meyer et al., 1997: 153). Thus, economic dependency reduces the
possibility of less-developed countries to tailor international educational for-
mulas to national needs and purposes.
14
Latin American scholars, who have a long history of analyzing structures
of external dependency, have been especially sensitive to the imposition of
foreign educational models. The Comisión Económica para América Latina de
las Naciónes Unidas (CEPAL)questioned the utilitarian character of education-
al planning in international organizations: “Economic growth is a needed
condition for the human and social development but not a sufficient one.
70
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
14. China represents a contrasting case. Due to its geopolitical position and relative auton-
omy,China has been able to selectively adapt Western educational models and techniques
to its own requirements and capacities (Lewin, 1987: 440).
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
71
This requires the implementation of adequate institutional and political
reforms in the framework of an integral and organic conception of develop-
ment process” (cited in Gimeno, 1981: 118). At a pivotal UNESCO conference
of Latin American and Caribbean ministers of education in 1979, it was
argued that the lack of relevance of the region’s education systems stemmed
from the fact that
those systems have been created and developed…by following models
of countries where the levels and features of development are very dif-
ferent, without any allowance being made for the specific historical
context of the education systems….Moreover, imported educational
models are inseparable from the development models that have like-
wise been imported and which have been underscoring the dependent
character of the societies and economies of the region. The transplanta-
tion of models which are not in keeping with the cultural identity of
countries does not foster a sufficiently intensive endogenous effort to
identify problems and priorities and to devise types and forms of edu-
cation that are consonant with actual national needs and capabilities…
(UNESCO,1979b: 24).
Education, as stated by the Mexico Declaration, should play a decisive
role in creating a new, more balanced style of “authentic” development in
whichthe production of goods and services is in line with “genuine social
and national necessities.” Education should give a human dimension to devel-
opment, based on principles of social justice that strengthen awareness, par-
ticipation, solidarity,and organizational ability, especially among underprivi-
leged groups (UNESCO,1979c: 69–70).Educational planners in particular
should playamediating role in securing the active participation of different
sectors and actors and in helping to preserve cultural identities, redefine
development goals, and overcome the forces of external domination
(Gimeno,1981: 128).Education is a population’s right and it must be at the
service of the whole social life (Terra, 1983).
Recent postcolonial histories of Somalia, South Africa, and Nigeria
underscorehow traditional models of education and development seldom
respond to people’s“genuine” needs and expectations (Abdi, 1998, 2003;
Nwagwu, 1997; Harber, 1998; Soudien, 1994; Mzamane, 1990; Kallaway,
1984, 1989). The African quest for modernity, based on a different model of
development, would eliminate Euro-modernity and gradually integrate
indigenous, Afro-Christian, and Afro-Islamic traditions (Mazrui and Wagaw,
1985: 59). African intellectuals are deliberating on new conceptions of educa-
tion and development, which draw upon non-Western cultures and are not
designed for profit-seeking purposes (Devisse, 1995). From a Muslim view-
point, the many shortcomings of international models are striking: “only
Muslim people themselves can change and reform their education system—
its entire structure, content, methodology and direction—in a fundamental
way” (Khan, 1981: 23).
Final Note
Critiques from the “periphery” appear to have been partially heard by inter-
national agencies in the business of circulating educational policy. The dis-
course of the 1990s has integrated a multitude of new or reworked terms:
gender parity, equitable access to appropriate learning and life skills, regional-
ization of education administration, endogenous education, localization, out-
of-school education, flexibility, human development, and competencies. But
have educational movers and shakers in Latin America, Asia, and Africa
become genuine partners in the elaboration of their educational policies? Or
has the lexicon been enhanced without an effect on the basic power inequali-
ties between international educational experts and local decision makers?
Undoubtedly, new actors have consolidated a position that mediates
between two poles—the global and the local. The last decade has witnessed
the emergence of new transnational advocacy networks in education (Mundy
and Murphy, 2004). A diverse range of nongovernmental organizations—for
example, associations against child labor and the trafficking of women, aid
and relief organizations, teacher and principal unions—have launched cam-
paigns in support of public education for all. The efforts of transnational
advocacy networks to link problems of educational access to issues of debt
relief, human rights, and global equity, have been realized in recent interna-
tional policy conferences (e.g., the 2000 World Education Forum held in
Dakar). If this form of educational advocacy continues to develop (which
seems likely), it may succeed in transforming the process by which interna-
tional educational policies are generated and circulated (Mundy and Murphy,
2004: 20–21). The creation of such a global civil society may modify the
terms of debate, reposition actors in this multi-dimensional system, and give
rise to more contextualized educational models.
72
GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL EXPANSION
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
73
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