Scholars in the Marketplace is a case study of market-based reforms at Uganda's Makerere University. With the World Bank heralding neoliberal reform at Makerere as the model for the transformation of ...higher education in Africa, it has implications for the whole continent. At the global level, the Makerere case exemplifies the fate of public universities in a market-oriented and capital friendly era. The Makerere reform began in the 1990s and was based on the premise that higher education is more of a private than a public good. Instead of pitting the public against the private, and the state against the market, this book shifts the terms of the debate toward a third alternative than explores different relations between the two. The book distinguishes between privatisation and commercialisation, two processes that drove the Makerere reform. It argues that whereas privatisation (the entry of privately sponsored students) is compatible with a public university where priorities are publicly set, commercialisation (financial and administrative autonomy for each faculty to design a market-responsive curriculum) inevitably leads to a market determination of priorities in a public university. The book warns against commercialisation of public universities as the subversion of public institutions for private purposes.
The Edison schools Saltman, Kenneth J
2005, 20050302, 2005-02-02, 2005-03-02
eBook, Book
The story of the Edison Schools is a gripping tale of money, kids, and greed. What began in the 1980s as an enterprise to transform public schools quickly became a troubled business battling falling ...test scores and dismal stock prices. How did the most ambitious for-profit education company in U.S. history lose respect, money, and credibility in such a short time?Revealing how American McEducation went from glory to crisis, The Edison Schools tracks entrepreneur Christopher Whittle's plan to introduce a standardized nationwide curriculum and cut administrative waste. Education specialist Kenneth J. Saltman finds that the critics' predictions came true in Edison schools across the country: Experienced teachers left in droves, students were virtually given answers to standardized tests to drive up scores, and difficult students were "counselored" out.
"Privatization of America's Public Institutions" describes the transformation of the military, K-12 public schools, public universities and colleges, and prisons into enterprises focused on ...generating profits for a select few. In many cases, privatization has limited accessibility, promoted segregation, fueled declining standards, increased costs, and reduced quality.
Summary Background During the early-1990s, adult mortality rates rose in most post-communist European countries. Substantial differences across countries and over time remain unexplained. Although ...previous studies have suggested that the pace of economic transition was a key driver of increased mortality rates, to our knowledge no study has empirically assessed the role of specific components of transition policies. We investigated whether mass privatisation can account for differences in adult mortality rates in such countries. Methods We used multivariate longitudinal regression to analyse age-standardised mortality rates in working-age men (15–59 years) in post-communist countries of eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union from 1989 to 2002. We defined mass privatisation programmes as transferring at least 25% of large state-owned enterprises to the private sector within 2 years with the use of vouchers and give-aways to firm insiders. To isolate the effect of mass privatisation, we used models to control for price and trade liberalisation, income change, initial country conditions, structural predispositions to higher mortality, and other potential confounders. Findings Mass privatisation programmes were associated with an increase in short-term adult male mortality rates of 12·8% (95% CI 7·9–17·7; p<0·0001), with similar results for the alternative privatisation indices from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (7·8% 95% CI 2·8–13·0). One mediating factor could be male unemployment rates, which were increased substantially by mass privatisation (56·3% 28·3–84·3; p<0·0001). Each 1% increase in the percentage of population who were members of at least one social organisation decreased the association of privatisation with mortality by 0·27%; when more than 45% of a population was a member of at least one social organisation, privatisation was no longer significantly associated with increased mortality rates (3·4% 95% CI −5·4 to 12·3; p=0·44). Interpretation Rapid mass privatisation as an economic transition strategy was a crucial determinant of differences in adult mortality trends in post-communist countries; the effect of privatisation was reduced if social capital was high. These findings might be relevant to other countries in which similar policies are being considered. Funding None.
This book analyzes Chile's political economy over the last 30 years and the country's attempt to build a market society in a highly inegalitarian society, now as a member country of the Organization ...for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). The investigation provides a historical background of Chilean economy and society and discusses the cultural underpinnings of the imposition of free markets, the macroeconomic and growth performance of the 1990s and 2000s and the social record of privatization of education, health and social security. The treatment documents the growing concentration of economic power among small groups of elites in Chile and discusses the limits of the democratic system built after the departure of the Pinochet regime.
An investigation of the role of educational privatization and technology in the crises of truth and agency. Today, conspiracy theories run rampant, attacks on facts have become commonplace, and ...systemic inequities are on the rise as individual and collective agency unravels. The Alienation of Fact explains the educational, technological, and ideological preconditions for these contemporary crises of truth and agency and explores the contradictions and competing visions for the future of education that lie at the center of the problem. Schools are increasingly reimagined as businesses, and high-stakes standardized testing and curricula, for-profit charter schools, and the rise of educational AI put capital and technology at the center of education. Yet even as our society demands measure, data, and facts, politicians and news outlets regularly make unfounded assertions. How should we make sense of the contradictions between the demand for radical data-driven empiricism and the flight from evidence, argument, or theoretical justification? In this critical investigation of the new digital directions of educational privatization—AI education, adaptive learning technology, biometrics, the quantification of play and social emotional learning—and the politics of the body, Saltman shows how the false certainty of bodies and numbers replaces deliberative and thoughtful agency in a time of increasing precarity. A distinctive contribution to scholarship on public school privatization and educational technology, politics, policy, pedagogy, and theory, The Alienation of Fact is a spirited call for democratic education that values creating a society of “thinking people” over capitalistic gains.
This article formulates a mixed oligopoly in which a public firm competes with two private firms that may adopt corporate social responsibility (CSR). We then determine the optimal privatization ...policy and find that, depending on CSR level and cost differences among firms, either nationalization or full privatization can be optimal. For identical cost functions, we also show the optimal degree of privatization is decreasing with the level of CSR if private firms are homogeneous, while it is non-monotone with the CSR level in a significant heterogeneity of objectives among the firms. Our analysis suggests that CSR activities that affect the magnitude of heterogeneity among firms are crucial in choosing an optimal privatization policy in a mixed oligopoly.
Plusieurs contributions rendent compte des évolutions du secteur privé en France, en Belgique, au Québec et en Suisse principalement, tandis que d'autres attirent l'attention sur l'entrée par la ...marge du secteur privé : à travers l'aide aux devoirs, les cours de perfectionnement, le soutien à la rédaction de mémoires, la publication d'indicateurs de performances des écoles ou encore l'extension du baccalauréat international dans le monde. En prenant un peu de liberté avec la table des matières, nous revenons ci-dessous sur quelques contributions-clés qui aident à caractériser les processus en cours et à saisir la nature des transformations à l'oeuvre. Faut-il soutenir cette offre privée complémentaire à l'école publique ou plutôt aménager le service public afin qu'il puisse mieux répondre, sous forme de services complémentaires, à des demandes spécifiques de ce type ? L'auteur ne tranche pas, mais il refuse d'exclure a priori la première option. Les analyses proposées par Christian Maroy d'une part, par Bernard Convert et Lise Demailly d'autre part se situent à un autre niveau et tentent de montrer comment la place prise par des opérateurs privés et les débats qui y sont associés révèlent une évolution plus large des savoirs et de l'école en tant qu'institution.
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