NN40, May 2008
Education for Sustainable Development? Or The Sustainability of Education Investment? A Special Issue
How Long Should Donors Support those Countries who cannot currently Afford Education for All?
By Ingemar Gustafsson, Stockholm University
Email: ingemar.gustafsson@ped.su.seKeywords
EFA, donor support, sustainability
Summary
This article examines the debates about the sustainability of EFA in countries that cannot afford EFA without donor asistance.
The Dakar goals are financially sustainable provided that national economies grow. Whether such growth is environmentally sustainable is a broader question that cannot be answered in a general way for education alone. It is probably also context-specific.
A somewhat more intriguing question is whether a national system of education as we know it, and which should be competitive in the global economy is financially and professionally sustainable in economies which only create a small surplus for the majority of the population. A comparison between the state of basic education in Sweden before the industrial revolution (which happened during the second half of the 19th century) will illustrate this. The Swedish ?Dakar goals? were realized through adult education up to the end of the 19th century. It was only then that Sweden had a professional group of primary school teachers for all whose salaries were paid by the public sector. Up to that point, the resources came from ?the land? i.e. it was the farmers in each village who financed school buildings and who engaged a person with some rudimentary qualifications to teach. Sometimes it was a soldier or church person with some book knowledge and ability to read and write. As for the rest, it was up to the head of the household to see to it that everybody on the farm could read.
In contrast, the situation in Africa after independence has been different. It has been taken as a given that basic education, including skills training, should be financed from public sources and have professionally-trained teachers. As a result, and with the help of donors, most African systems have expanded very fast, against a background of recurring economic problems and a fairly slow transition from the subsistence economy, at least for the majority of the population.
There are many good reasons for the global educational choices that have been made; international human rights standards, adherence to Jomtien and Dakar Action Plans and the Millennium Development Goals, the need to compete on the international market, expectations by the great majority for a better life after independence, the need to strengthen the national identity through education etc. etc. From this perspective it may not be far from the reality to describe the whole modernisation project in education in Africa as a ?Fast Track Initiative?.
At the same time, it would be wrong to assume that all countries have to follow the same path, that there is one rate of expansion and one way to describe the correspondence between education, and economic-and-social development. The manpower approach in the 1960s was an expression of such an idea and we know that it did not work. The education system was always lagging behind the needs of the economy and manpower needs could not be predicted.
Today, the education systems in most countries are neither financially nor professionally sustainable in the short (20 year) term. The answer has been financial aid and technical assistance.
From a donor point of view, the dilemma, up to the introduction of Programme Based Approaches, has been to support innovative projects. These projects have been seen as sustainable when integrated into broader national reforms. In many cases this has not happened. Such projects have not survived without external support.
It is partly this experience that has driven the Paris Agenda for Aid Effectiveness. The donor perspective has shifted. The role of the donors is now seen to be to contribute, financially and professionally to the creation of national capacity within the field of education.
The implication is that reform processes, including sustainability considerations, are seen as a national political process. Donors enter and step out of this process as they deem fit or when countries decide that they do not want aid for education.
From a perspective of sustainability, it is difficult to see that there should be a natural cut-off point. As long as the systems expand and the countries count on foreign aid, there will a need for additional resources. Also, the manpower situation in Africa is such that it is difficult to meet the needs for teachers, nurses and doctors within the foreseeable future.
The sustainability of the system can only be defined in relation to some agreed objectives and will be a context-specific answer to the question. It will be in terms of ?the parties have agreed that when there is parity between boys and girls in primary education, the external funds will diverted towards other needs.?
So the answer is that as long as the international aid system exists as it is today, there is no general way to answer the question. From a donor point of view, the question of sustainability only makes sense when defined at the level of individual projects.
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