1.1. Study objectives
1.2. Methodology
1.3. Structure of the report
1.4. Literature review
This report presents the findings of research that has examined the intellectual, political and organisational processes that have shaped government and donor policies and projects concerned with promoting the education of women and girls in Malawi, Tanzania and Zimbabwe. The study seeks in particular to assess the extent to which gender interventions in education have been donor driven. The growing concern about large and persistent gender inequalities in education has led to the development of a number of initiatives on the part of multilateral and trilateral aid agencies aimed at encouraging the participation of women and girls in education. Despite this concern, efforts to reduce gender inequalities on the part of both governments and donor agencies have been uneven and policy interventions have evolved in a piecemeal fashion.
The Education for all Conference in Jomtien in 1990 resulted in over 100 government plans of action being formulated, which included strategies to address inequities in girls' educational participation. Donors also committed themselves to increase spending on basic education1. Despite these commitments, UNESCO statistics presented at the Amman Mid Decade Review of Jomtien revealed that the gender gap in literacy levels has widened since 1990 (Leach, 1997). The lack of significant progress is also indicated by the fact that, of the 29 strategic actions decided upon at the Nairobi meeting to mark the end of the UN Decade on Women (1996-1985) relating to education, 20 were repeated in the Platform of Action produced at the Beijing conference ten years later due to poor or non-existent implementation (see Stromquist, 1997). An examination of the national reports prepared for Beijing also reveals that few governments have implemented policies to improve the condition and status of women in education.
1 The outcome of these commitments has been questioned by Bennell, 1998.
In order to explore the reasons for the limited progress that has been made in improving girls' education in most developing countries, this study focuses on policy formulation and implementation with respect to girls' education in three low income African countries. Four main research questions have been addressed:
· What kind of knowledge relating to gender and education was available to policy makers when policies and projects were first designed and how has this knowledge been incorporated in the policy making process?· How have lessons learned from the gender and education initiatives been incorporated into subsequent policy and practice?
· What have been the main political, social and cultural obstacles to implementing gender policies and projects?
· Which constituencies and alliances inside and outside of each country have supported gender equality in education?
In order to answer these questions, each country case study; (i) Gives an overview of the access, persistence and attainment of girls and women at various levels of the education system; (ii) Assesses how academic and other research findings concerned with gender and education have contributed to policy change; (iii) Reviews government education and gender policies in order to assess the bureaucratic, political and social constraints preventing the attainment of gender equality in education; and (iv) Examines donor support to the education sector and girls' and womens' education and looks, in particular, at the way in which donor priorities have shaped gender interventions. Donor coordination is examined from the point of view of 'lessons learned' from prior experience in the area of gender and education. Issues concerning the 'ownership' of policies and programmes are explored in the light of relationships between host government and agencies. The role of NGOs in gender advocacy and providing alternative models is also considered.
The methodology employed for this study is qualitative in nature and it relies heavily on a country comparative approach. The three case study countries were deliberately selected because they all have significant gender components in their education policy. Nonetheless, there are also important differences between them with respect to both policy formulation and implementation which makes country comparisons particularly interesting. The role of three key aid agencies ODA, (DFID since May 1997), Sida and UNICEF is explored in detail because all three organisations have made significant interventions to redress gender inequalities in education in one or more of the case study countries.
Gender inequalities in education are considered across the entire education system in each case study country, including formal and non-formal provision. Primary data collection involved structured interviews with government, donor and NGO personnel. Secondary data were also obtained from government departments, aid agencies (headquarters and field offices) academic institutions and NGOs in each case study country. Although every effort has been made to adhere to the same analytical framework in each of the three countries, the availability of primary and secondary data varied considerably.
Most of the interviews of government officials were done by local researchers: Stella Bendera (Tanzania), Esme Kadzamira (Malawi) and Rosemary Gordon (Zimbabwe). Nicola Swainson coordinated the project from Sussex University and also conducted some of the field research (particularly in Tanzania and Zimbabwe).
The remainder of this introductory chapter consists of a short literature review that highlights the main issues covered in the report. Chapter 2 outlines the gender and education policies of the three aid agencies: DFID, Sida and UNICEF. The three country case studies on Malawi, Tanzania and Zimbabwe are then each presented in turn. The final chapter contains the report's overall conclusions.
Given its focus on policy formulation and implementation in education, this study draws on literature concerning gender and development (GAD), gender and organisations as well as education. As has been repeatedly emphasised, lack of knowledge about gender is often seen as an impediment to implementation. However, it is often not the need to know, but what government officials want to know that is key. All too often, knowledge about women's experiences of development is simplified in order to fit existing bureaucratic criteria (Goetz, 1995).
Any process of 'opening up' to new ideas involves politics, and gender advocates have an important role to play in this respect. Political, organisational and cognitive factors all affect the incentive structures of development 'actors' including NGOs, the state and aid agencies.² Donor agencies have played a central role in commissioning research on both GAD and gender and education. However, much of this has been geared towards meeting their own development goals rather than those of the beneficiaries (Kardam, 1995). Policies involve the distribution of power and resources, and the political and bureaucratic operations of both international agencies as well as national and local governments affect the outcomes of gender policies and programmes. If a gender project is not perceived as important, its implementation will suffer because bureaucrats will not give it priority. As Kabeer has pointed out, '..the failure to promote gender equity in development policies cannot be attributed to a 'lingering irrationality' among planners but a rational defence of class interests. This applies to both donor agencies and national bureaucracies as well as communities' (Kabeer, 1994:37).
² For further elaboration of this point see Nuket Kardam, 1995.
The rise of the 'women in development' (WID) movement in the decade after the Nairobi Conference on Women in 1985 has helped to put gender at or near the top of the development agenda of many international agencies and governments. Accordingly, governments have signed up to international conventions³ and committed themselves to supporting various rights of women and children. In the African context, the Pan African Conference on Girls' Education in 1993 urged African governments to address issues relating to girls' education (the Ouagadougou Declaration). In order to render these resolutions effective, coalitions and alliances are needed both internationally and inside the countries concerned. A good example of this is the Forum of African Women Educationalists which was formed in 1992, with a continent wide membership of key politicians and educational personnel. Its main goals are to mainstream gender in national education programmes and convince society of the importance of educating girls. However, the discourses of WID/GAD are often ambiguous with wide variations in interpretation between different stakeholders. This often leads to misunderstandings and a lack of consensus in the understanding of gender inequalities.4
³ Such as the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against women.4 The term 'empowerment' for example has entered into development discourse. This has variable definitions and emphases; third world women usually define it in terms of the capacity of women to increase their self reliant strategies.
Gender and Education: Gender analyses of education were originally undertaken in the countries of the industrial north. By the 1980s, relatively little systematic research on this topic had been done in the developing countries.5 Most of the early literature on gender and education was concerned with girls' access to schooling and economic outcomes in the labour market (Elliot and Kelly, 1980).
5 See literature reviews in Comparative Education, 1980 and Comparative Education, 1987.
Conventional human capital rationales for investing in women have been particularly influential. Research has shown that both the social and private rates of return to girls' primary education are generally high. From the late 1980s, the World Bank sponsored a number of country studies which showed very significant social and economic benefits from investing in the education of females (Floro and Wolf, 1990, Bustillo, 1989, Herz et al, 1991, King and Hill 1993). The level of maternal schooling was found to be especially important in promoting the education prospects of girls (Bustillo, 1989). Other positive outcomes that have been consistently highlighted are increased productivity, reduced fertility, reduced child and maternal mortality, and improving the environment (Herz et al, 1991 and Summers, 1992). According to this paradigm, under-investing in girls' education is seen as being a 'waste' of human and economic potential.
Most research on gender and education to date has concentrated on the access, persistence and attainment, the financing of education - the role of teachers and the curriculum have not be adequately addressed. Numerous gender specific education projects have been tried by governments, donors and NGOs in a variety of combinations in many developing countries. These have included bringing schools closer to communities, improving textbooks, increasing the number of women teachers, scholarship programmes for secondary school girls etc. Research evidence has shown that policy 'packages' are likely to be more effective than single interventions (Swainson, 1996). However, as King and Hill (1993) have pointed out, most gender activities in education have been single interventions.
Analyses of gender and education produced by the World Bank and other donors have relied heavily on a simple supply and demand framework. The dominance of economic theory in the World Bank and other donor agencies has resulted in arguments in favour of better educational provision for girls being mainly couched in terms of 'efficiency'. Although World Bank sponsored research has resulted in the development of some useful strategies, it has tended to be too simplistic and economistic. Crucial issues such as the high incidence of schoolgirl pregnancies and HIV/AIDs in many SSA countries can only be explained through the complex web of relations between household, community and school (Swainson, 1996). It is clear that the factors militating against positive education outcomes for girls are not purely economic. In the absence of such an understanding, there is a danger that gender problems and solutions become de-politicised and prescriptions consist of 'wish lists' with no indication of how to set priorities.
