Disadvantage and Participation Accountability Processes: Theory and Evidence from School Development and Management Committees in Karnataka, India

这一跨学科项目将开展创新的、与政策相关的研究，重点是解决研究问题：“社会、政治、经济和文化背景下的互动动态如何促进或抑制在特定发展中国家提供优质教育？“.印度2009年《儿童免费义务教育权利法》第21条要求设立一个学校发展和管理委员会，由教师、家长和儿童监护人以及有关地方地区的民选代表组成; SMC中至少75%的成员必须是父母/监护人（其中50%必须是妇女），并有一定比例的弱势群体代表，如在册种姓和部落以及少数宗教。校董会负责监察学校的运作，拟备学校发展计划并提出建议，以及监察从有关政府或任何其他来源获得的赠款的使用情况。在实践中，家长，特别是属于在册种姓/部落和少数群体的家长，是被动的参与者，很少在学校管理委员会中发表意见，往往受有关学校校长的支配。在这个项目中，我们将首先开发一个概念框架（使用来自教育研究，行为经济学和博弈论的见解）。从理论上和经验上研究贫困、边缘化和排斥（统称为“不利处境”）如何影响父母的信念和能动性。这将有助于我们详细了解解释他们在当地学校的问责过程中被动参与和缺乏发言权的机制，这可能会在几代人之间放大不利条件所带来的不利条件。其次，我们将收集证据，结合定量（基线/底线调查，随机对照试验）和定性方法（焦点小组，半结构化访谈），对扶贫问责制框架的潜在影响。基线调查将产生公民报告卡+（CRC+，其中包括对供应方限制的分析）和社区记分卡（CSC）（两者都是由我们的合作者公共事务中心（PAC）开创的）。实地工作将实施和评估一个培训方案（基于“反思”和“反思！行动！行动援助组织制定的“关于”的政策，以鼓励弱势群体积极参与和发挥关键作用。该项目将审查这一方案是否（a）对北方卡纳塔克邦农村某些地区贫困边缘化社区（在册种姓/部落和少数民族）父母的信仰、愿望和能动性产生积极影响，（B）促使他们积极参与学校管理委员会，并（c）改善其子女（男孩和女孩）的教育/学习成果。我们的项目的出发点是以下观察：虽然属于弱势群体的父母可能知道自己的权利，但他们可能缺乏信心，对自己影响制度的能力感到悲观，即使他们在影响其子女教育成果的问责过程中发挥积极作用。如果问责进程要有效，就必须达到积极参与的关键门槛，但这种参与代价高昂，这种信念可能导致根本的集体行动问题的结果，即没有人行使其正式参与权，从而导致其子女的教育成果低下。据我们所知，我们的项目将构成第一个随机对照试验（RCT）的反映程序的评估，我们将能够确定这种干预措施对赋权和问责的因果关系。

This interdisciplinary project will carry out innovative, policy-relevant research, focused on addressing the research question: "How do interacting dynamics in the social, political, economic and cultural context enable or inhibit the delivery of quality education in specific developing country contexts?".Section 21 of The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 (RTE) in India calls for the establishment of a School Development and Management Committee (SMC) consisting of teachers, parents and guardians of children and elected representatives within the concerned local area; a minimum 75% of the SMC are required to be parents/guardians (of which 50% must be women) with proportionate representation from disadvantaged groups e.g. scheduled castes and tribes and minority religions. The SMC monitors the working of the school, prepares and recommends the School Development Plan and monitors the utilization of grants received from the appropriate government or any other source. In practice, parents especially those who belong to scheduled castes/tribes and minorities) are passive participants and rarely exercise voice within the SMC and tend to be dominated by Head Teachers of the concerned Schools. In this project, we will, first, develop a conceptual framework (use insights from education research, behavioural economics and game theory. to examine, both theoretically and empirically, how poverty, marginalization and exclusion (collectively referred to as "disadvantage") impact on the beliefs and agency of parents. This will help us understand in detail the mechanism explaining the passive participation and lack of voice in the accountability processes within their local schools, which potentially amplify, across generations, the disadvantage imposed by disadvantage. Second, we will collect evidence, combining both quantitative (baseline/endline surveys, Randomized Control Trials (RCT)) and qualitative methods (focus groups, semi-structured interviews), on the potential impact of a pro-poor accountability framework. The baseline survey will lead to a Citizen Report Card+ (CRC+ which includes an analysis of supply side constraints as well) and the Community Score Card (CSC) (both pioneered by the Public Affairs Centre (PAC), our collaborators). The fieldwork will implement and evaluate a training programme (based on "Reflect" and "Reflect!on Act!on", developed by Action Aid ) to encourage active participation and critical engagement by disadvantaged groups. The project will examine whether such a programme (a) impacts positively on the beliefs, aspirations and agency of parents belonging to poor marginalised communities (scheduled castes/tribes and minorities) in certain districts in rural Northern Karnataka , (b) results in their active, critical engagement within the SMC, and (c) improves the educational/learning outcomes of their children (both boys and girls). The starting point of our project is the following observation: although parents belonging to disadvantaged groups may be aware of their rights, they may lack confidence and be pessimistic about their ability to influence the system even if they were to take an active role in an accountability process which impacts on the education outcomes of their children. When a critical threshold of active participation is required for an accountability process to be effective but such participation is costly, such beliefs could lead to an outcome of the underlying collective action problem where nobody exercises their formal rights of participation, thus contributing to the low educational outcomes of their children. To the best of our knowledge, our project would constitute the first randomized control trial (RCT) evaluation of a Reflect program and we will be able to identify the causal effect of this interventions on empowerment and accountability.