1st Edition

Educational Planning in a Decentralised System The Papua New Guinean Experience

172 Pages

by Routledge

Description

Decentralisation emerged as a prominent policy trend during the 1960s and 1970s, in both industrialized and less developed countries. In the latter, it became a popular reform for immediate post-independence governments, and Papua New Guinea was no exception. With only three million people but 19 provincial governments and 20 ministers for Education, Papua New Guinea appeared at the time to... Read more

Introduction 1. Theoretical issues and practical constraints: an international perspective 2. The political history of decentralisation in Papua New Guinea 3. Decentralisation and the education system 4. Decentralisation and the financial system 5. Decentralisation and inter-provincial inequalities 6. Diversity and conformity in the education system 7. Decentralisation and efficiency 8. Participation in educational decision-making 9. Conclusions: lessons from the Papua New Guinean experience

Author(s)

Biography

Mark Bray began his career as a teacher in Kenya in 1970. In 1973 he moved to Benue State, Nigeria, and then in 1976 to Kano. In 1978 he was appointed to a lectureship in the Centre of African Studies at the University of Edinburgh. This book is based on his PhD thesis completed at the University of Edinburgh and on subsequent follow-up research. Later in his career, Mark Bray taught at the Universities of Papua New Guinea, London, and Hong Kong. Between 2006 and 2010 he took leave from Hong Kong to work in Paris as Director of UNESCO’s International Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP). He currently holds the UNESCO Chair in Comparative Education at the University of Hong Kong.

Critics' Reviews

Reviews of the first publication:

‘Bray’s book offers a concise, clear, and compelling exposition of the process of decentralisation…offer[s] extremely important empirical and conceptual contributions to the study of educational decentralisation.’

— Comparative Education, Vol. 22, No. 2

‘This is a valuable contribution to the body of literature on educational planning.’

— Journal of Educational Administration, Vol. XXIII, No. 2

‘Bray has given all students of education’s role in the development process a useful case study of an important subject.’

— Pacific Affairs, Volume 58, Issue 4

‘Mark Bray is to be congratulated…for writing a clear, succinct, and eminently balanced account of Papua New Guinea’s experiment with decentralized educational planning…’

— Comparative Education Review, Volume 29, Number 4