Adrián Zancajo

What Are the Role and Impact of Public-Private Partnerships in Education? A Realist Evaluation of the Chilean Education Quasi-Market

The superiority of market mechanisms in educational provision is a premise that has received renewed emphasis under the regime of public-private partnerships (PPPs). The central idea of PPPs—enthusiastically embraced by a range of international organizations, development agencies and scholars—is grounded in the assumption that competition between public and private schools is an effective means of promoting education quality and efficiency. PPP policy frameworks are expected to establish genuine market dynamics in which suppliers innovate and boost the quality of their education services as a way to attract families, who are portrayed as benefit maximizers and well-informed consumers. The application of these market ideas to education, however, has suffered from a series of modifications and failures under real world conditions. This study is based on the case of Chile—the most market-oriented education system in the world—and examines how few of the taken-for-granted benefits of market-oriented provision either have been or can be fulfilled, due to the nature of the supply structure and to the effects of agents’ expectations and behaviors.

Multiple Paths towards Education Privatization in a Globalizing World: A Cultural Political Economy Review.

Abstract Over the last two decades, education privatization has become a widespread phenomenon, affecting most education systems and giving place to a consistent increase in private school enrolment globally. However, far from being a monolithic phenomenon, privatization advances through a variety of context-sensitive policy processes that translate into multiple policy outcomes. This paper aims at understanding why and how education privatization unfolds in a broad variety of settings and, to this purpose, examines the different manifestations of education privatization on the light of Cultural Political Economy (CPE). The conceptual and analytical tools provided by CPE prove to be particularly well suited to explore such a multi-faceted and multi-scalar phenomenon. CPE has helped us to capture the intersect and tension between different drivers (global and local, material and ideational) of education privatization through the evolutionary mechanisms of variation, selection and retention. On the basis of a systematic literature review methodology, encompassing 227 research papers, the article identifies and systematizes six different paths towards education privatization – understood as groups of frequently associated circumstances, mechanisms and courses of action leading to privatization. Conceived as ideal types, these different paths ultimately allow for a richer understanding of education privatization and show that the international diffusion of education privatization norms and discourses is far from producing policy convergence at a global scale.

Making Poor Choices? Demand Rationalities and School Choice in a Chilean Local Education Market

ABSTRACT Although the literature on school choice rationalities is extensive, different authors interpret the processes of school choice for poor families in different ways. Positions vary between those that consider that poor families have the same capacity to choose as middle class families and those that value structural factors as constraints for choice. The objective of this article is to identify different school choice rationalities of low income families in the context of a highly marketized education system such as Chile. Beyond the restrictions of a different nature that poor families face, this social group mostly expresses high levels of reflexivity and complex sets of preferences when it comes to choosing schools for their children. This article tries to overcome the dualistic division that prevails in school choice literature between choice as an outcome of utility maximization for all, and choice as a denial for deprived groups.

Educational differentiation policies and the performance of disadvantaged students across OECD countries

This article focuses on analysing the effect of educational differentiation policies of OECD educational systems on socioeconomically disadvantaged students, based on data from PISA 2009. The analysis is conducted on the basis of a definition of two subgroups of disadvantaged students: those that achieve high scores, and those obtaining scores that are significantly below the average for their country. Educational systems are classified in four models following the classification proposed by N. Mons. Results show that the more integrated the educational system, the greater the number of disadvantaged high achievers, and the lower the number of disadvantaged low achievers.

Taking Advantage of Catastrophes: Education Privatization Reforms in Contexts of Emergency

Episodes of disaster are powerful triggers of education reform. The sense of urgency and bewilderment associated with catastrophic situations (including natural disaster or armed conflicts) prove a seizable opportunity for education reform advocates, rendering other stakeholders more receptive to drastic interventions. In particular, catastrophic situations are distinctive enablers of privatization and pro-market education reforms in that they allow for a particularly accelerated and drastic advancement of such types of reforms.

Is There Real Freedom of School Choice? An Analysis from Chile

Between 1981 and 1990, Chile began to implement an education reform based on school choice and a financing system through vouchers. In theory, the system ensures complete freedom of choice of school by families. This paper attempts to identify the existence of factors that conditioned the enrolment process in the different types of schools existing nowadays in the Chilean educational system, the largest quasi-market of Latin America. Results show a social stratification and separation by schools and indicate how geographical distance and social composition are the most critical factors for families when choosing a school.