Decentralization as a Political Weapon: Education Politics in El Salvador and Paraguay

What explains why some governments advanced decentralized education in the 1990s while others shied away from such efforts? Some arguments suggest that decentralization was pursued to improve the coverage and quality of education. Others point to partisanship, ideology, or diffusion. Drawing on case studies of El Salvador and Paraguay, I argue instead that governments pursued education decentralization in part because it could be deployed as a political weapon to weaken teachers’ unions affiliated with the opposition, thus depressing mobilization and votes for their rivals. These findings contribute to the literature on decentralization by highlighting a new political motivation fueling decentralization efforts across the developing world—the demobilization of the opposition.

Decentralization of Education in Nepal: A Rein in a Horse Nose

The main argument of this article is to shed light on the dubious nature of the decentralization policy of education and the 'intention' of the state to recentralize it, in one way or other, despite the widespread clatter of decentralization. By taking policy documents into account, I intend to justify my claim that what the Nepal government calls it, an educational decentralization, is nothing but policy rhetoric and a reign hold tactically at the centre. I claim what the state calls it as an autonomous power of ground-level functionaries to exercise their discretionary in decentralized education system instead is, 'a rein in a horse nose', where jockey (the centre) is 'always' in a commanding position. To expatiate educational decentralization, I employ Weiler's (1990) standpoint and juxtapose his arguments: redistributing power, enhancing efficiency, and improving learning to show that though these arguments are put in favour of decentralization, the same arguments are shown to conflict with powerful forces favouring centralization. I also focus on the context and motivation in which the educational decentralization was carried out to understand the egression of decentralization in education in Nepal. In the final section, I try to analyse the dubious tendency of the state and try to explore, 'why despite prioritizing decentralization in policies, there is a periodicity of higher bodies in the education system'.

Current Status, Issues, and Challenges of Blockchain Applications in Education

Due to the unique characteristics of decentralization and security, blockchain is believed to have considerable potential to provide a wide range of benefits for ed-ucation development. Its application in education is relatively new but increasing very quickly. This paper introduced the typical blockchain techniques and charac-teristics briefly. Then, recent applications of blockchain in education were sum-marized comprehensively, especially those regarding learning record keeper, cer-tificate issue and management, and decentralized education ecosystem. Finally, technical and non-technical challenges were discussed. It is hoped to provide an in-depth look at the perspectives of blockchain in evolving education and help to the development of new application systems.

Personnel Politics: Elections, Clientelistic Competition and Teacher Hiring in Indonesia

What is the effect of increased electoral competition on patronage politics? If programmatic appeals are not credible, institutional reforms that move politics from an elite- to a mass-focused and more competitive environment increase patronage efforts. This leads to an overall surge and notable spike in discretionary state hiring in election years. The study tests this prediction in the context of Indonesia’s decentralized education sector. The authors exploit the exogenous phasing in and timing of elections in Indonesian districts for causal identification. They find evidence of election-related increases in the number of contract teachers on local payrolls and increases in civil service teacher certifications, which dramatically increases salaries. These effects are particularly pronounced for districts in which the former authoritarian ruling party is in competition with new entrants.