NN41, December 2008
The New Politics of Partnership: Peril or Promise?
A Cautionary Tale of an International Educational Partnership in Latin America
By Christopher Martin, London Institute of Education
Email: cmartinlemarchant@gmail.comKeywords
Partnership, Education, Latin America, Mexico, Ford Foundation
Summary
At the beginning of this millennium, following a steady rise in its funds, the Ford Foundation launched two large educational programmes in its overseas offices: the International Fellowship Programme and the Pathways to Higher Education programme. This article reflects on the partnerships created by, and connected to, these programmes.
At the beginning of this millennium, following a steady rise in its funds, the Ford Foundation launched two large educational programmes in its overseas offices. They are still active. One is a postgraduate scholarship programme aimed at underprivileged students, the International Fellowship Programme (IFP); the other complementing it, Pathways to Higher Education (PHE), is directed at making higher education institutions (HEIs) more responsive to the needs of underprivileged students.
This ?big bet? as it is termed in the Foundation received very large amounts of funding, the IFP being the largest single programme ever created by the Foundation. The programmes were entrusted to the field offices rather than centrally directed since the Foundation considered that collaborating with local partners gave them the best chance of taking root and becoming sustainable. The PHE offered particularly fruitful opportunities for collaboration since it was directed at institutions rather than individuals receiving a one-off scholarship.
The Mexico and Central America office focussed both programmes at the historically marginalized indigenous population. In Central America it supported a variety of HEIs. But in Mexico, it found an organization that could co-ordinate all its projects ? a national association of HEIs, ANUIES. In spite of its representing most of Mexico?s HEIs it is institutionally weak, teetering between the government and the academia, and often caught in the cross fire between the two. It is dependent on the former for its funds but the latter are its associates, its raison d?etre. The PHE gave ANUIES the chance to spread its wings a little by being independently funded to run its own pioneer initiative in educational affirmative action in Mexico. Fortunately the under-ministry of Higher Education (SESIC) was working in the same direction, through its own scholarship program and, along with other government departments, an innovative program of ?intercultural? awards and scholarships directed particularly at the indigenous population.
By 2006, a critical mass of educational programmes, including the SESIC, Ford-ANUIES efforts had been formed. This harmonious relationship between the various agencies helped put affirmative action on the national agenda but also drew the attention of the World Bank to the PHE as a potential model for combating educational inefficiency in HE.
A non-refundable loan was allocated to develop and replicate the PHE model in many more HEIs than the Foundation could have managed. All seemed well. However, once the loan was made, inexplicable delays occurred in getting the money out of the treasury via SESIC and through to ANUIES to match Foundation funds that had been assigned to activities needing to be coordinated with those of the Bank. It soon became apparent that old rivalries had surfaced again within and between agencies. In particular, SESIC was keen to retain some Bank funds, earmarked for PHE, to help support some of its own programmes, SESIC considering that as the official recipient of Bank funds, it could exercise its discretion over funds that were after all for HE affirmative action in which SESIC was just as involved as ANUIES-Ford. After a long and tense period of uncertainty, funds were indeed divided up between the SESIC programmes and ANUIES. The Foundation and the Bank, unwilling to enter the fray, stood somewhat frustrated on the sidelines.
At face value, of the particular agendas of the partners, the Mexican national ones would seem to have been the most self-interested and the most distanced from purely educational concerns by political in-fighting. This is often how international funders tend to characterize deviations from their apparently altruistic intentions. This view is deceptive. Donors do not stand outside history and politics as disinterested empowering agencies. The World Bank is championing its educational efficiency cause and the Ford Foundation, its prized cultural asset, affirmative action. The Mexican partners accepted both because they brought funds into the educational system and were compatible with their own aims. Nevertheless, neither the Bank?s nor the Foundation?s agenda were government priorities. Indeed the affirmative action agenda was occasionally seen as a rival to the intercultural approach the Mexican administration was taking at the time. Looked at closely, the Mexican partners were no more self-interested than the international ones. ANUIES was fighting to retain leadership of an external programme that it had taken to its heart, and SESIC was struggling to give coherence to the most enlightened policy of educational inclusion ever seen in Mexico and an example to the rest of the continent.
The winner in the end was Mexican higher education that benefited from the coming together of various forces to promote the neglected area of equal opportunity. This partnership created a momentum that eventually transcended particular interests and institutional agendas.
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