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，重点解决以下研究问题：“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背景下提供优质教育？”印度2009年《儿童享有免费和义务教育权利法》第21条要求建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，例如在册种姓和部落以及少数宗教。校董会监督学校的运作，制订和建议学校发展计划，并监察从适当的政府或任何其他来源收到的补助金的使用情况。实际上，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，很少在校董会内发声，往往由相关学校的校长主导。在这个项目中，我们将首先开发一个概念框架(使用教育研究、行为经济学和博弈论的见解。从理论和经验两方面考察贫困、边缘化和排斥(统称为“不利”)如何影响父母的信仰和行为。这将有助于我们详细了解解释当地学校在问责过程中被动参与和缺乏发言权的机制，这可能会在几代人中放大劣势带来的不利影响。第二，我们将结合定量方法(基线/终点调查、随机对照试验)和定性方法(重点小组、半结构访谈)，收集关于扶贫问责框架的潜在影响的证据。基线调查将产生公民成绩单+(CRC+，其中也包括对供应方面限制的分析)和社区记分卡(CSC)(两者均由我们的合作者公共事务中心(PAC)首创)。实地工作将实施和评估一项培训方案(以行动援助组织制定的“反思”和“反思行动”为基础)，以鼓励弱势群体的积极参与和批判性参与。该项目将审查这一方案是否(A)对北卡纳塔克邦农村某些地区贫困边缘社区(在册种姓/部落和少数民族)的父母的信仰、愿望和行动产生积极影响，(B)使他们积极、关键地参与SMC，以及(C)改善其子女(男孩和女孩)的教育/学习成果。我们项目的出发点是：尽管属于弱势群体的父母可能意识到自己的权利，但他们可能缺乏信心，对自己影响制度的能力持悲观态度，即使他们在影响子女教育结果的问责过程中发挥积极作用。如果问责制进程需要一个关键的积极参与门槛才能有效，但这种参与代价高昂，这种信念可能会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较低。据我们所知，我们的项目将构成对Reflect计划的第一次随机对照试验(RCT)评估，我们将能够确定这种干预措施对赋权和问责的因果影响。

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.