CERC Monograph Series in Comparative and International Education and Development
No.5
Education, Growth, Aid and Development
Towards Education For All
Edited by Linda Chisholm, Graeme Bloch & Brahm Fleisch
Click here to download the book flyer
ISBN 978-962-8093-99-1. (2008, 116pp.)
HK$100 (local), US$16 (overseas)
published by Comparative Education Research Centre (CERC) in collaboration with the Southern African Comparative and History of Education Society (SACHES)
This book brings together leading authors in the field of education and development, who draw on decades of research and personal experience to assess what we have learnt from research over three decades on school effects, the utility and sustainability of target-setting in education, and the role of global and local forces in shaping change in African education. The chapters expose to critical scrutiny the targets and benchmarks associated with the Education for All (EFA) initiatives and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
The book’s contributing authors raise questions about the false expectations of target-setters, the failures of international development aid processes to assist the achievement of the MDGs, the denial of local context and history in the target-setting processes, the arbitrary selection of targets, the choice of definitions that enable manipulation of data to show they have been achieved, and the inability of individual countries to sustain reforms initiated with development aid without aid.
Here is a rich set of reflections on development thought and practice at the start of the twentieth century, representing the cumulative wisdom and judgement of scholars who have made an indelible mark on educational thought. They present a formidable set of conceptual, practical and political challenges for consideration by the development world in its target-setting processes, especially in the field of education.
Linda Chisholm is a Director in the Education, Science and Skills Development research programme at the Human Sciences Research Council in Pretoria. Graeme Bloch is Education Specialist at the Development Bank of Southern Africa. Brahm Fleisch is a Professor of Education at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.
Table of Contents
Preface (Linda Chisholm)
1. Lessons from the past two decades: Investment choices for education and growth (Martin Carnoy)
2. Aid agency support for education: Gaps between intention and action (Christopher Colclough)
3. Why some Education for All and Millennium Development Goals will not be met: Difficulties with goals and targets (Keith Lewin)
4. Education, skills, sustainability and growth: Complex relations (Kenneth King)
5. The developmental state in Africa (Dani W. Nabudere)