Public Policy Analysis

MPA 404 Lecture 12

Previous Lecture

The objectives and approaches to policy analysis

Various kinds of analysis

Technical concepts like IRR, Opportunity costs, PV, etc.

Today’s first activity is an article about something that we discussed in the last lecture. So please follow the link http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/05/25/china-smog-companies/9496357/. Read the article.

Short discussion on the darker, less debated side of China’s spectacular growth.

Let’s go through a practical example of how to go about policy analysis. This Analysis of Madrassa Education project over the years is taken from Sarfaraz Khwaja’s Public Policy book.

First, he goes through a brief history of Madrassa education system. It charts its start and evolution through centuries.

A brief history of madrassa’s in Pakistan since its inception. States that the main reason for the growth of madrassa’s in Pakistan has been the lack of proper public education system.

We can easily make an interpretation here: that the kind of resource crunch that the government faces is not faced by madrassa’s. Probable reasons: people are generous in giving in the name of religion and educating their children in religious doctrines (behavioral insight), and madrassa’s have only their system to deal with, in contrast to the government who has to deal with all the country’s affairs. In other words, a madrassa in a particular locality is good at knowing people, their habits, arranging for funds and looking after their affair. Their work load is much smaller, thus they are more efficient at their job.

Why so many children go to madrassa? Its cheap, its near, and poor people cannot afford to send their children to public schools (which are usually located far away. Even if they are not, public transport is missing).

The mushroom growth of these institutions happened in early 1980’s when the government approved the equivalence of a madrassa degree to a F.A/B.A degree (policy). Plus, the war against USSR in Afghanistan (context) complemented this growth tremendously as these became sanctuaries to all foreigners arriving in Pakistan from all over the world.

Notice here another policy: inviting people from all over the world to come and join jihad on part of government. This policy and the policy of keeping proxy armies has backfired tremendously over the years.

The launch of Madrassa reform project (2003-2007). By that time, there were an estimated 8,000 madrassa's in Pakistan, operating without any oversight or any regulation. The project was launched at an estimated cost of Rs. 5795.395 million/- (more than five billion rupees).

Major objectives: a) streamline education; b) bring it at par with formal education system; c) teach formal subjects in all of these madrassa’s; and d) offer financial incentives to madrassa teachers to update their qualification and use latest equipment.

Four years into the program, it was thought appropriate to evaluate the outcomes. The results were very dismal. For example, only about 6 %madrassa’s benefitted from the scheme and only 3% madrassa students got started with formal subject education.

Planning commission was asked to come in and revive this thing.

But why did government came up with this plan after all? What was the need? It goes back to a misguided government policy in 1994, whereby registration of madrassa’s was stopped. The thinking (very wrong one) was that it will discourage establishment of further madrassa’s and encourage people to send their children to public schools. This was misguided thinking since it did not take into consideration the demand (which never decreased), the lack of public schools (which made madrassa’s even more attractive),and that these institutions ran without government funds (meaning that disowning them had little effect).

9/11 changed this policy of ambiguity on government’s part as they asked all madaris to get registered. Especially important was the clause that their funds would be audited. The madaris refused this completely, arguing that private schools never get their financials audited, so why should they? (context: the argument of equal treatment).

The agreement between Madaris and government has not materialized yet. Problem identification. Reasons: Mistrust and exogenous shocks. The attempts to force the madaris to accept government demands in the wake of 9/11created mistrust in madaris that the government is toeing western line. Exogenous shocks came in the form of increased foreign funding for madaris, and government coming under pressure to regulate their activities.

The evaluation under MRP was being done under three ministries. Yet despite their evaluation, nothing came of it. What does it show? Lack of proper staff, human capital and coordination.

The evaluation of reforms for the project was carried out under Input-Output method (commonly known as CIPP or Context, Input, Process and Product model).

Context includes stuff like identifying the background of the problem, the need for reform, delineate the actual and desired outcomes and look for value orientation.

Input involves provision of information regarding the project. It includes views of all the relevant people, capabilities of the relevant agencies, operational plan, etc.

Process involves the detection of defects in earlier designs and recommendations for improvements, identifying potential sources of failure and continuous feedback about the project, etc.

Product involves the operational definition of the objectives, comparative analysis, and making informed guesses about the potential outcomes in lieu of the gathered information.

The next stage was to conduct a random sampling of the madrassa's as ten percent sample of the whole.

The practical start was taken on the basis of a questionnaire that was filled initially in two madrassa’s. The evaluation officers were trained about the exercise beforehand. In light of the received answers, the questionnaire

was modified. This modification also included input in the form of observations from the evaluating officers.

Once the final questionnaire was prepared, a team was trained for the project and then sent to the randomly selected madrassa’s. This survey was followed by the data compilation and analysis.

Once the final compilation and analysis was done, the findings were formally presented. Decisions were made then, and recommendations were made based upon these data. For example, it was found that the percentage of madrassa’s without a proper building (Pakka building) were much less than public schools. Therefore, there was less financial requirement in this regard.

Similarly, it was found that the toilet, library and complementing facilities were available in almost all of madrassa’s which, again, meant that funds wouldn’t be required in this regard.