Jeff Ross, MPA
One year ago this month, Michelle Rhee stepped down as chancellor of the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS). Anyone who has lived in the District knows that it is an odd mix of national and local priorities, Redskins fans and Cowboys fans, transplanted individuals and born-and-raised lifers. But no matter how connected or disconnected one is with the goings on of local DC issues and politics, nearly everyone who lived in the District from 2007-2010 had an opinion about “that Korean lady who was running the schools.”
Ms. Rhee, selected as chancellor by Mayor Adrian Fenty in 2007 shortly after the D.C. City Council voted to establish direct mayoral control of the public school system, was young for an urban superintendent and had a non-traditional background for a superintendent of a large urban school district. She taught elementary school in Baltimore for three years before founding the non-profit The New Teacher Project, an organization that has worked with urban school districts to recruit or hire over 43,000 teachers. At the time, DCPS had long been considered one of the worst performing school districts in the nation, a system that spent one of the highest amounts of dollars per student yet got some of the lowest academic outcomes in the country. Leadership had been a constant revolving door, with six different superintendents in the previous ten years.
In the three plus years of Ms. Rhee’s controversial tenure, she brought a sense of urgency coupled with significant change aimed at improving the school system as quickly as possible. Washington Post writer Bill Turque, who covered the D.C. Public School system since relatively early in Ms. Rhee’s tenure, recently wrote a review of Ms. Rhee’s record. For the most part, I think it paints a fair picture of the successes (improvements in student outcomes and test scores, operational improvements in central office functions and food service, increased focus and importance on education as a civic issue) and challenges (opposition from some parents and community members, continued high principal turnover) faced by Ms. Rhee during her tenure, with a few caveats:
1) While the statistics surrounding D.C. Public Schools prior to Ms. Rhee’s tenure mentioned earlier are well-known and oft-cited, I think people often forget just how much agreement there was in the unacceptable state of affairs in DCPS at that time. The landslide 9-2 vote to enact mayoral control coupled with the unanimous vote to approve Ms. Rhee as chancellor are but two markers of the universal call for change at the time.
2) A noticeable omission from the article was the focus Ms. Rhee and DCPS put on ensuring every school had an arts, music, and physical education program. While parents and teachers alike often complain of the edging out of more robust educational opportunities in some schools (particularly those in urban areas) in favor of more practice with tested subjects (reading and math), DCPS under Ms. Rhee invested significant resources to ensure these options were available to all students for the first time.
3) Turque mentions that parents and community members felt that Ms. Rhee moved forward with school improvement efforts – including but not limited to closing underutilized school buildings – despite their stated objections. Indeed, Ms. Rhee faced decreasing approval ratings from D.C. residents during her tenure. However, it is important to note that while residents disapproved of Ms. Rhee personally in increasing numbers, Washington Post polls found that residents were in fact more satisfied with the levels of safety and overall satisfaction with public schools under Ms. Rhee, suggesting that much of the discontent was communication or personality related.
As a former employee of DCPS under Ms. Rhee, I certainly think that there were things that could have been done better. While I’m sympathetic to the position of Ms. Rhee and others that when it comes to student outcomes, change and improvement cannot happen fast enough, I think that it is crucial to present such efforts in as fair and collaborative manner as possible. While some would call that a subtle distinction, such a mindset shift would potentially have large effects on the number of new programs created, the rollout of vital new systems like the IMPACT teacher evaluation system, and communication with elected officials and community members. That’s why I’m confident in the future of DCPS under the leadership of current DCPS chancellor Kaya Henderson, who brings the same unwavering passion and commitment to improved student outcomes with a more inclusive style. Nevertheless, I think it’s important to take stock of where things were just a short time ago, and to have the understanding that such meaningful and positive change wouldn’t have occurred without the efforts of Chancellor Michelle Rhee.
Monday, October 17, 2011
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Seeing Beyond Tomorrow: The scourge of extreme poverty and finally ending it
Ayokunle Abogan, MPA
Can we end extreme poverty within the next three decades?
This question was posed in an article I read while in Nigeria, my home country. In trying to answer it, I cannot help but view the problem from a personal angle. Herein I share Modupe’s story.
Modupe is a woman I met during a volunteer project created to eradicate poverty in Nigeria. She is a Nigerian woman, likely in her mid-thirties, although she can only guess. AIDS (contracted from her now-dead husband), poverty, and hunger have taken a devastating toll on her—she looks more like 60. Does Modupe worry whether her six children also have AIDS? No. She doesn’t have time to worry. She’s focused solely on daily survival. Her mother, who lives with her, needn’t worry about AIDS—she’s already dying of tuberculosis.
Modupe scavenges for scrap paper at the rubbish dump to sell to market vendors. If Modupe is lucky, she can make as much as 60 cents a day. When luckier, she finds discarded dregs of produce, meat and dairy. Most days Modupe is not lucky. She averages three to four meals in a week. Land surrounds her leaf-and-mud hut but the adjacent factory’s chemical wastes have rendered the land toxic, infertile. It doesn’t matter. Dying of AIDS, Modupe can barely scavenge, never mind farm, competing alongside scores of others scrabbling for scraps. They suffer, too.
I know Modupe. I know many like her. Too many.
Nearly 1.2 billion people worldwide—one-sixth of the world’s population—suffer from extreme poverty. No clean water, sanitation, or electricity. The numbers are staggering. Illiteracy ensures that they continue to suffer. Some regions with entrenched cycles of poverty, death, and inequity, helplessly pass them from one generation to another. In my continent, Africa, more than half of us live in extreme poverty. Come 2040, nearly 30 years from now, the world’s population is forecast to increase to 8.8 billion, with more than 70% living in so-called developing countries. If we can’t manage poverty now, how will we manage it then on such a greater scale?
To cite statistics here, however, is to intellectualize a crisis that one must feel viscerally. Ironically, society today is now inured to others’ pain while being simultaneously, due to technological advances, close enough to observe it. We witness yet remain detached, isolated. But if you experience directly what I have experienced, the more critical question becomes: “Can we really afford to wait 30 years?”
International organizations including the World Bank and the UN emphasize improving income levels. That doesn’t work. It benefits only a small percentage, the educated, who better grasp how to improve living standards. The illiterate do not.
Basic needs must be met first. How can people educate themselves if they don’t even have food or water? If disease is everywhere around them? Surviving today isn’t just a means to an end; it becomes the end itself. Resolving basic needs will then naturally segue into health services, education and improved housing.
These are the core necessities we must provide our starving brothers and sisters:
Modupe doesn’t have 30 years. Neither do we.
Can we end extreme poverty within the next three decades?
This question was posed in an article I read while in Nigeria, my home country. In trying to answer it, I cannot help but view the problem from a personal angle. Herein I share Modupe’s story.
Modupe is a woman I met during a volunteer project created to eradicate poverty in Nigeria. She is a Nigerian woman, likely in her mid-thirties, although she can only guess. AIDS (contracted from her now-dead husband), poverty, and hunger have taken a devastating toll on her—she looks more like 60. Does Modupe worry whether her six children also have AIDS? No. She doesn’t have time to worry. She’s focused solely on daily survival. Her mother, who lives with her, needn’t worry about AIDS—she’s already dying of tuberculosis.
Modupe scavenges for scrap paper at the rubbish dump to sell to market vendors. If Modupe is lucky, she can make as much as 60 cents a day. When luckier, she finds discarded dregs of produce, meat and dairy. Most days Modupe is not lucky. She averages three to four meals in a week. Land surrounds her leaf-and-mud hut but the adjacent factory’s chemical wastes have rendered the land toxic, infertile. It doesn’t matter. Dying of AIDS, Modupe can barely scavenge, never mind farm, competing alongside scores of others scrabbling for scraps. They suffer, too.
I know Modupe. I know many like her. Too many.
Nearly 1.2 billion people worldwide—one-sixth of the world’s population—suffer from extreme poverty. No clean water, sanitation, or electricity. The numbers are staggering. Illiteracy ensures that they continue to suffer. Some regions with entrenched cycles of poverty, death, and inequity, helplessly pass them from one generation to another. In my continent, Africa, more than half of us live in extreme poverty. Come 2040, nearly 30 years from now, the world’s population is forecast to increase to 8.8 billion, with more than 70% living in so-called developing countries. If we can’t manage poverty now, how will we manage it then on such a greater scale?
To cite statistics here, however, is to intellectualize a crisis that one must feel viscerally. Ironically, society today is now inured to others’ pain while being simultaneously, due to technological advances, close enough to observe it. We witness yet remain detached, isolated. But if you experience directly what I have experienced, the more critical question becomes: “Can we really afford to wait 30 years?”
International organizations including the World Bank and the UN emphasize improving income levels. That doesn’t work. It benefits only a small percentage, the educated, who better grasp how to improve living standards. The illiterate do not.
Basic needs must be met first. How can people educate themselves if they don’t even have food or water? If disease is everywhere around them? Surviving today isn’t just a means to an end; it becomes the end itself. Resolving basic needs will then naturally segue into health services, education and improved housing.
These are the core necessities we must provide our starving brothers and sisters:
- Enhanced food production. Food is fuel; we don’t run without it. Farmers comprise 60+ percent of the world’s extremely poor. Why not teach subsistence farming techniques for that 60 percent? A simple application of the “give a man a fish and he eats for a day; teach him to fish and he eats for a lifetime” philosophy. Governments must invest in responsible farming techniques, tools, storage, and irrigation, and also develop suitable transit of farm products to outlying marketplaces.
- Basic Infrastructure and Amenities. Clean water supply, electricity, and basic sanitation are taken for granted yet are all but unknown to the impoverished. The technology exists! Waste recycling, management, education and facilities will cut disease. Healthcare facilities decrease malaria and HIV/AIDS and preventable death. Rainwater harvesting, water wells, and hand pumps when appropriate, can provide additional water—substantial hours are spent daily traveling to obtain water; local water quality inspections limits typhoid and other water-related problems. Constructing micro-hydroelectric plants to boost electricity supply can funnel power to those outside centralized grid sources. Basic sanitation systems eradicate health risks, lessen water source pollution, and enhance human dignity.
- Education. In addition to lifestyle education, developing human capital leads to better jobs, wages, and living conditions. The educated make informed decisions concerning healthcare, reproduction, employment, and economic equality. Attendance at school until a legally-employable age, for men and women, and vocational training/skills improvement for adults lacking education are a must.
- Debt Relief. Developed countries not only consume most of the world’s resources but also have technology to improve their economies. With debt relief, struggling countries can focus their resources to address national poverty. Fluctuating food prices and high energy proces make it more difficult for poor people to afford enough food to eat. Food and energy represent 60 percent of impoverished household expenditure. Even the US, an affluent nation, has seen much of its middle and lower classes forced into poverty by rising food and energy costs while battling unemployment and foreclosure in an economic crisis. The Middle East continually faces riots due to spiraling food costs. Mitigating the devastating price swings and economic slowdowns in developing countries is critical.
Modupe doesn’t have 30 years. Neither do we.
Africa for Africans? State-sanctioned foreign “land grabs” in Ethiopia
Feker Tadesse, MPA
Coming back to Princeton from JFK airport, an Indian gentleman struck up a conversation with me, inquiring where I was from. When I told him I was from Ethiopia, he proceeded to talk positively about the recent developments in the country, particularly leasing of land to foreign investors. Relieved as I was that the mention of “Ethiopia” didn’t automatically prompt him to lament about droughts and famine, nevertheless I was hard pressed to share his optimism for what’s been dubbed “The Land Grab of Africa.”
The Prime Minister of Ethiopia, Meles Zenawi, recently expounded on what leasing land to foreign investors would mean to the country’s economy. His argument was simple enough: there was plenty of idle land in the countryside that communities had neither agricultural nor settlement use for. Hence, foreign investors would transfer technology, create jobs for the locales, and increase government revenue. Thus far, some regions such as Benishangul Gumuz have leased around 2 million hectares to Saudi investors.
Critics are quick to point out the irony of a country that is dependent on food aid leasing out masses of fertile land so that countries like Saudi Arabia can ensure national food security. Moreover, the premise that the land being leased is idle land is under strong scrutiny. Stories regarding displacement of local populations have been circulating in the media. Secondly, environmental degradation is a real concern, particularly with the introduction of intensive agricultural ventures like horticulture that leave the land no longer viable for agricultural purposes. Finally, the prime minister’s argument that the agricultural sector in Ethiopia will not grow unless large scale mechanized farms come to its rescue is far from convincing. There are countless studies that claim quite the opposite: increasing the productivity of smallholder farmers is by far a better strategy to tackle rural poverty.
Given that the “land grab” issue is fairly recent, there is a lack of clear information on what exactly is taking place on the ground. While the PM’s arguments make sense theoretically, if recent allegations, particularly those on displacement of the local population hold true, this can hardly be praised as a government’s initiative towards foreign direct investment.
Coming back to Princeton from JFK airport, an Indian gentleman struck up a conversation with me, inquiring where I was from. When I told him I was from Ethiopia, he proceeded to talk positively about the recent developments in the country, particularly leasing of land to foreign investors. Relieved as I was that the mention of “Ethiopia” didn’t automatically prompt him to lament about droughts and famine, nevertheless I was hard pressed to share his optimism for what’s been dubbed “The Land Grab of Africa.”
The Prime Minister of Ethiopia, Meles Zenawi, recently expounded on what leasing land to foreign investors would mean to the country’s economy. His argument was simple enough: there was plenty of idle land in the countryside that communities had neither agricultural nor settlement use for. Hence, foreign investors would transfer technology, create jobs for the locales, and increase government revenue. Thus far, some regions such as Benishangul Gumuz have leased around 2 million hectares to Saudi investors.
Critics are quick to point out the irony of a country that is dependent on food aid leasing out masses of fertile land so that countries like Saudi Arabia can ensure national food security. Moreover, the premise that the land being leased is idle land is under strong scrutiny. Stories regarding displacement of local populations have been circulating in the media. Secondly, environmental degradation is a real concern, particularly with the introduction of intensive agricultural ventures like horticulture that leave the land no longer viable for agricultural purposes. Finally, the prime minister’s argument that the agricultural sector in Ethiopia will not grow unless large scale mechanized farms come to its rescue is far from convincing. There are countless studies that claim quite the opposite: increasing the productivity of smallholder farmers is by far a better strategy to tackle rural poverty.
Given that the “land grab” issue is fairly recent, there is a lack of clear information on what exactly is taking place on the ground. While the PM’s arguments make sense theoretically, if recent allegations, particularly those on displacement of the local population hold true, this can hardly be praised as a government’s initiative towards foreign direct investment.
Making Butter Without the Cream of the Crop: Overcoming the bimodality of urban school choice
Drew Haugen, MPA
In the education reform world, charter schools have been garnering a lot of attention. Schools like KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program), started in Houston in 1994, have achieved tremendous gains with students from underserved communities and have taken their model nation-wide.
Charters like KIPP also usually endure a barrage of criticism and scrutiny. Common critiques range from charges that they take the “cream of the crop” of available students to accusations of being quick to expel students with behavior, language, or disability issues. Others argue that their model is financially unsustainable.
My critique of charter schools like KIPP is through a different lens—what I call the Commitment Dilemma.
Commitment to a school like KIPP, with its longer days, Saturday school, longer academic year, hours of homework every night, and a rigorous behavioral culture, is a hefty commitment for a child of any ability level to make. Colorado State Senator Mike Johnston, my boss this summer and former principal of a high school that dealt with at-risk students, explained the Commitment Dilemma to me using the following analogy.
Let’s say, hypothetically, that all students have 100 “Free-time Commitment Points.” These 100 points represent the available free-time a student has for the activities to which they can devote their energies outside of mandatory requirements (sleeping, the seven-hour school day required by law, etc.).
Students can allocate their Free-time Commitment Points however they like, divvying them up between activities like studying, family time, organized sports, time with friends, and so forth.
For the purposes of this example let’s say that to graduate in the middle of her class at a KIPP school the average low-income urban student, Shirley, must allocate 80 of her total 100 Free-time Commitment Points to KIPP and the additional time, activities, and homework KIPP requires.
In contrast, Shirley’s local school, which is not as academically rigorous and does not yield the same high probability of college acceptance for Shirley as KIPP, is nonetheless a safe and moderately performing school that many of Shirley’s friends attend. To graduate from this school in the middle of her class requires 40 of Shirley’s Commitment Points.
Now let’s pause for a moment and inject some self-reflection into this analogy. Say I give you two options for the undergraduate institution you will attend: Vanderbilt or CalTech. You must choose one of these two options.
If my intuition is correct, a number of my capable and intelligent readers will choose Vanderbilt and a number will choose CalTech.
Applying our Free-time Commitment Points analogy, my guess is that readers who want to devote a large portion of their Points to academic extracurriculars like course reading, studying, and so forth in exchange for a more rigorous academic experience will choose CalTech. I’d also guess that readers who want to spend more of their Free-time Commitment Points on activities not directly related to school, such as social events, sports, and so on, will choose Vanderbilt.
This is a rough analogy, but the gist is this: students that are equally capable and intelligent (my readership) will choose different schools for different reasons and some of these reasons have little or nothing to do with academic pursuits.
Luckily for us, CalTech and Vanderbilt are both academically rigorous institutions that yield intellectual development and professional readiness for their students and a baseline of required academic proficiency in order to receive a diploma.
The same cannot be said of Shirley’s choices in our example. Even if Shirley is an above-average student with 60 Points to commit to academic enrichment, she falls short of the extraordinary commitment required to succeed at KIPP and will most likely end up in her neighborhood school. Shirley becomes a cautionary tale. This is the Commitment Dilemma.
It is true that KIPP achieves extraordinary results. But KIPP also enjoys extraordinarily committed administrators, teachers, parents, and students. The portion of our society willing to devote this much free-time and energy to schooling is a small minority.
If we can assume normality of student free-time commitment levels, then ideally there should exist a normal distribution of school options for students like Shirley to pick from. It would be a relatively easy endeavor for Shirley to find a school to match, or come close to, her 60-Commitment Point level.
All schools in this distribution would require a baseline academic proficiency of their students equivalent to a high school diploma or GED. As schools increase their academic enrichment activities (longer days, school years, more homework, AP and IB courses, advanced diplomas, etc.), so would their Free-time Commitment requirement.
Near the top of this distribution, we would find schools that prepare students for entry into elite higher education institutions. Near the bottom of this distribution, we would find schools that prepare students for success in community and junior colleges and entry-level four-year institutions.
Unfortunately, the reality of what most poor urban students encounter is a bimodal distribution of school options. Their first option is a low-commitment school, usually a failing public school that graduates them unprepared for success at a community college. The other option is a high commitment school, usually a rigorous charter school that prepares them for success at a mid-range four-year college.
The education reform movement must devote more energy to “building out the middle” of this currently bimodal distribution of school options. The development of rigorous and challenging schools for administrators, teachers, parents, and students of all commitment levels must be a much stronger priority.
A fitting model is the California higher education system, which was reorganized under the 1960 Master Plan for Higher Education.
The Master Plan organized California’s higher education system into tiers. Tier 1 is comprised of the state’s marquee institutions—the University of California (UC) system. The California State University system makes up Tier 2, and the state’s community and junior college system rounds out Tier 3.
In California, the top 12.5% of graduating seniors are guaranteed a spot at one of the UC schools. The top 33% is guaranteed a spot at a Cal State, and California Community Colleges are to admit “any student capable of benefiting from instruction.”
This diversification of higher educational opportunities in California has yielded tremendous results: enrollment has increased ten-fold since 1960, while the California population has only approximately tripled. What’s more, there are avenues for advancement and enrichment between tiers: Santa Monica Community College in Los Angeles is the #1 institution for transfers to UCLA and UC-Berkeley.
By providing a similarly wide array of school options for public K-12, all of which afford students rigorous opportunities for academic proficiency and enrichment, our school system will yield higher retention levels, better academic fits for students, and more robust achievement on a large scale. Our education system must adapt itself to make butter with all types of milk—not just the cream.
In the education reform world, charter schools have been garnering a lot of attention. Schools like KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program), started in Houston in 1994, have achieved tremendous gains with students from underserved communities and have taken their model nation-wide.
Charters like KIPP also usually endure a barrage of criticism and scrutiny. Common critiques range from charges that they take the “cream of the crop” of available students to accusations of being quick to expel students with behavior, language, or disability issues. Others argue that their model is financially unsustainable.
My critique of charter schools like KIPP is through a different lens—what I call the Commitment Dilemma.
Commitment to a school like KIPP, with its longer days, Saturday school, longer academic year, hours of homework every night, and a rigorous behavioral culture, is a hefty commitment for a child of any ability level to make. Colorado State Senator Mike Johnston, my boss this summer and former principal of a high school that dealt with at-risk students, explained the Commitment Dilemma to me using the following analogy.
Let’s say, hypothetically, that all students have 100 “Free-time Commitment Points.” These 100 points represent the available free-time a student has for the activities to which they can devote their energies outside of mandatory requirements (sleeping, the seven-hour school day required by law, etc.).
Students can allocate their Free-time Commitment Points however they like, divvying them up between activities like studying, family time, organized sports, time with friends, and so forth.
For the purposes of this example let’s say that to graduate in the middle of her class at a KIPP school the average low-income urban student, Shirley, must allocate 80 of her total 100 Free-time Commitment Points to KIPP and the additional time, activities, and homework KIPP requires.
In contrast, Shirley’s local school, which is not as academically rigorous and does not yield the same high probability of college acceptance for Shirley as KIPP, is nonetheless a safe and moderately performing school that many of Shirley’s friends attend. To graduate from this school in the middle of her class requires 40 of Shirley’s Commitment Points.
Now let’s pause for a moment and inject some self-reflection into this analogy. Say I give you two options for the undergraduate institution you will attend: Vanderbilt or CalTech. You must choose one of these two options.
If my intuition is correct, a number of my capable and intelligent readers will choose Vanderbilt and a number will choose CalTech.
Applying our Free-time Commitment Points analogy, my guess is that readers who want to devote a large portion of their Points to academic extracurriculars like course reading, studying, and so forth in exchange for a more rigorous academic experience will choose CalTech. I’d also guess that readers who want to spend more of their Free-time Commitment Points on activities not directly related to school, such as social events, sports, and so on, will choose Vanderbilt.
This is a rough analogy, but the gist is this: students that are equally capable and intelligent (my readership) will choose different schools for different reasons and some of these reasons have little or nothing to do with academic pursuits.
Luckily for us, CalTech and Vanderbilt are both academically rigorous institutions that yield intellectual development and professional readiness for their students and a baseline of required academic proficiency in order to receive a diploma.
The same cannot be said of Shirley’s choices in our example. Even if Shirley is an above-average student with 60 Points to commit to academic enrichment, she falls short of the extraordinary commitment required to succeed at KIPP and will most likely end up in her neighborhood school. Shirley becomes a cautionary tale. This is the Commitment Dilemma.
It is true that KIPP achieves extraordinary results. But KIPP also enjoys extraordinarily committed administrators, teachers, parents, and students. The portion of our society willing to devote this much free-time and energy to schooling is a small minority.
If we can assume normality of student free-time commitment levels, then ideally there should exist a normal distribution of school options for students like Shirley to pick from. It would be a relatively easy endeavor for Shirley to find a school to match, or come close to, her 60-Commitment Point level.
All schools in this distribution would require a baseline academic proficiency of their students equivalent to a high school diploma or GED. As schools increase their academic enrichment activities (longer days, school years, more homework, AP and IB courses, advanced diplomas, etc.), so would their Free-time Commitment requirement.
Near the top of this distribution, we would find schools that prepare students for entry into elite higher education institutions. Near the bottom of this distribution, we would find schools that prepare students for success in community and junior colleges and entry-level four-year institutions.
Unfortunately, the reality of what most poor urban students encounter is a bimodal distribution of school options. Their first option is a low-commitment school, usually a failing public school that graduates them unprepared for success at a community college. The other option is a high commitment school, usually a rigorous charter school that prepares them for success at a mid-range four-year college.
The education reform movement must devote more energy to “building out the middle” of this currently bimodal distribution of school options. The development of rigorous and challenging schools for administrators, teachers, parents, and students of all commitment levels must be a much stronger priority.
A fitting model is the California higher education system, which was reorganized under the 1960 Master Plan for Higher Education.
The Master Plan organized California’s higher education system into tiers. Tier 1 is comprised of the state’s marquee institutions—the University of California (UC) system. The California State University system makes up Tier 2, and the state’s community and junior college system rounds out Tier 3.
In California, the top 12.5% of graduating seniors are guaranteed a spot at one of the UC schools. The top 33% is guaranteed a spot at a Cal State, and California Community Colleges are to admit “any student capable of benefiting from instruction.”
This diversification of higher educational opportunities in California has yielded tremendous results: enrollment has increased ten-fold since 1960, while the California population has only approximately tripled. What’s more, there are avenues for advancement and enrichment between tiers: Santa Monica Community College in Los Angeles is the #1 institution for transfers to UCLA and UC-Berkeley.
By providing a similarly wide array of school options for public K-12, all of which afford students rigorous opportunities for academic proficiency and enrichment, our school system will yield higher retention levels, better academic fits for students, and more robust achievement on a large scale. Our education system must adapt itself to make butter with all types of milk—not just the cream.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
When it Comes to Colleges, Spare Us the Rankings (But Keep the Numbers)
Dan Fichtler, MPA
Arguably the most relied-upon college admissions advice for high school seniors comes not from a guidance counselor or an admissions officer or even a parent, but rather from the pages of a well-known magazine. The editors of U.S. News & World Report (USNWR) have just released the 2012 version of their annual college rankings (Editor’s note: Princeton #1!), and like in recent years, many soon-to-be applicants took another step towards higher education by consulting this publication to navigate the difficult decisions that lie ahead.
As has also become something of an autumn tradition, this year’s USNWR rankings were taken out to the woodshed by a wide variety of educators and pundits. The rankings have existed for nearly three decades now, and the charges laid against them are fairly predictable. Critics often cite the use of input-driven data (SAT scores and class rank of incoming students) rather than output-driven data (post-graduation salaries and percentages of alumni pursing or holding advanced degrees). Another common complaint is the ability of colleges and universities to manipulate data by changing their practices; that is, allocating resources towards those characteristics that the USNWR editors deem important, at the expense of the many other crucial elements of a college education. Anyone who has ever wondered why so many college courses are capped at the unusual level of 19 students, for example, can likely find an answer within the USNWR rankings formula.
But perhaps most objectionable is the idea that colleges and universities can be ranked in such a neat and simplistic way – or that they can be ranked at all. This criticism has more merit than any other that is regularly piled onto the USNWR editors (more on this point in a bit).
So how does USNWR determine these rankings? Well, it assigns each college and university an overall score, which is calculated via a relatively simple process. Data on a series of school characteristics are compiled, computed into common units, and summed, with different characteristics holding different weights. The schools are then ranked based upon their overall scores.
USNWR makes no attempt to hide its methodology[1], and yet anecdotal evidence suggests that very few high school seniors or their parents (or really anyone else for that matter) understand how the scores are calculated. And while an informal survey certainly cannot substitute for more rigorous hypothesis testing techniques, I sought to observe this anecdotal evidence. I asked about a dozen well-educated individuals to estimate the weight given to a school’s acceptance rate in the USNWR rankings. Answers ranged from a low of 8% to a high of 100%, with most falling in the range of 15-20%. The correct answer: 1.5%.
The table below provides the factors (and weights) used to determine the USNWR overall scores.
Perhaps what appears to be systematic overestimation of the importance of acceptance rates comes from perceptions encouraged by the USNWR critics. Stories in the media that demonize elite universities for lowering their acceptance rates to game the rankings may lead readers to believe that this single variable plays an important role in the rankings formula. Of course, there are plenty of reasons to be concerned about ever lower acceptance rates. There are also, however, plenty of reasons why schools might seek to lower their acceptance rates, USNWR aside. To directly or indirectly attribute causal effects to USNWR for this trend without considering these other factors represents nothing more than lazy analysis.
As the critics know, it is not difficult to find flaws in this system, or at least to question the validity of the specific weights assigned to various factors. What the critics often fail to acknowledge, however, is the valuable service that the USNWR editors provide. That service is the pure provision of information in a market that has otherwise been difficult for consumers to navigate.
Choosing which colleges to apply to, and eventually which to attend, are important life decisions. Future careers, lifelong friends, and even spouses are discovered during these years for many individuals, which therefore raises the stakes on the importance of making good decisions. If we believe that high school students (and parents and counselors) are best served by having access to information on many characteristics of colleges and universities, then we must applaud those who make this information widely available and easy to process. That group includes not only USNWR, by the way, but also the editors of rival rankings systems, who created their rankings in part to rectify what they felt were flaws in the USNWR system.
The creation of new, widely circulated systems suggests that college rankings will not be disappearing anytime soon. Forbes and Washington Monthly have entered the rankings game in recent years, and the college rankings edition of USNWR continues to sell remarkably well. And despite the valid criticisms of the specific USNWR methodology, the larger question remains: can simple rankings of colleges and universities across many variables help consumers?
For example, is #12 Northwestern really an incrementally better university than #13 Johns Hopkins? And is #2 Amherst really an incrementally better liberal arts college than #3 Swarthmore? They surely are not – at least not categorically. Ranking schools on this type of continuous scale therefore makes very little sense. For some students, Northwestern is a better option than Johns Hopkins; for others, the opposite is true. The same goes for Amherst and Swarthmore.
So how do students make these decisions? They could use the wide array of data that USNWR puts forth, comparing schools on the characteristics that are most important to them, whether those are class size or graduation rate or academic reputation. Some students certainly do this. Many others, however, fall victim to the “rankings-as-gospel” syndrome. Swarthmore may be a better fit for their personality and interests, but they cannot get beyond the fact that Amherst is ranked higher, and a mismatch occurs. The solution to this dilemma is quite simple: remove the rankings, keep the numbers.
And so the critics are correct – USNWR seems to be at least partially to blame for mismatching and suboptimal decision-making. But USNWR is also at least partially responsible for the good decisions of those students who are able to look past simple rankings and delve deeper into the data. Since 1983, USNWR has provided crucial information to students in an easy-to-digest manner. For that, they deserve our (partial) thanks.
Arguably the most relied-upon college admissions advice for high school seniors comes not from a guidance counselor or an admissions officer or even a parent, but rather from the pages of a well-known magazine. The editors of U.S. News & World Report (USNWR) have just released the 2012 version of their annual college rankings (Editor’s note: Princeton #1!), and like in recent years, many soon-to-be applicants took another step towards higher education by consulting this publication to navigate the difficult decisions that lie ahead.
As has also become something of an autumn tradition, this year’s USNWR rankings were taken out to the woodshed by a wide variety of educators and pundits. The rankings have existed for nearly three decades now, and the charges laid against them are fairly predictable. Critics often cite the use of input-driven data (SAT scores and class rank of incoming students) rather than output-driven data (post-graduation salaries and percentages of alumni pursing or holding advanced degrees). Another common complaint is the ability of colleges and universities to manipulate data by changing their practices; that is, allocating resources towards those characteristics that the USNWR editors deem important, at the expense of the many other crucial elements of a college education. Anyone who has ever wondered why so many college courses are capped at the unusual level of 19 students, for example, can likely find an answer within the USNWR rankings formula.
But perhaps most objectionable is the idea that colleges and universities can be ranked in such a neat and simplistic way – or that they can be ranked at all. This criticism has more merit than any other that is regularly piled onto the USNWR editors (more on this point in a bit).
So how does USNWR determine these rankings? Well, it assigns each college and university an overall score, which is calculated via a relatively simple process. Data on a series of school characteristics are compiled, computed into common units, and summed, with different characteristics holding different weights. The schools are then ranked based upon their overall scores.
USNWR makes no attempt to hide its methodology[1], and yet anecdotal evidence suggests that very few high school seniors or their parents (or really anyone else for that matter) understand how the scores are calculated. And while an informal survey certainly cannot substitute for more rigorous hypothesis testing techniques, I sought to observe this anecdotal evidence. I asked about a dozen well-educated individuals to estimate the weight given to a school’s acceptance rate in the USNWR rankings. Answers ranged from a low of 8% to a high of 100%, with most falling in the range of 15-20%. The correct answer: 1.5%.
The table below provides the factors (and weights) used to determine the USNWR overall scores.
Methodology Used by U.S. News & World Report in its 2012 College Rankings[2] | |
Component | Weighting (out of 100%) |
Undergraduate Academic Reputation | 22.5% |
Academic peer assessment | 15% |
High school counselor assessment | 7.5% |
Retention | 20% |
Six-year graduation rate | 16% |
Freshman retention rate | 4% |
Faculty Resources | 20% |
Average faculty salary (including benefits) | 7% |
Proportion of classes with fewer than 20 students | 6% |
Proportion of faculty with highest degree in their field | 3% |
Proportion of classes with 50 or more students | 2% |
Student-faculty ratio | 1% |
Proportion of faculty who are full-time employees | 1% |
Student Selectivity | 15% |
SAT and ACT scores of entering students | 7.5% |
Proportion of freshman graduating in top 10% of HS | 6% |
Acceptance rate | 1.5% |
Financial Resources | 10% |
Graduate Rate Performance | 7.5% |
Alumni Giving Rate | 5% |
As the critics know, it is not difficult to find flaws in this system, or at least to question the validity of the specific weights assigned to various factors. What the critics often fail to acknowledge, however, is the valuable service that the USNWR editors provide. That service is the pure provision of information in a market that has otherwise been difficult for consumers to navigate.
Choosing which colleges to apply to, and eventually which to attend, are important life decisions. Future careers, lifelong friends, and even spouses are discovered during these years for many individuals, which therefore raises the stakes on the importance of making good decisions. If we believe that high school students (and parents and counselors) are best served by having access to information on many characteristics of colleges and universities, then we must applaud those who make this information widely available and easy to process. That group includes not only USNWR, by the way, but also the editors of rival rankings systems, who created their rankings in part to rectify what they felt were flaws in the USNWR system.
The creation of new, widely circulated systems suggests that college rankings will not be disappearing anytime soon. Forbes and Washington Monthly have entered the rankings game in recent years, and the college rankings edition of USNWR continues to sell remarkably well. And despite the valid criticisms of the specific USNWR methodology, the larger question remains: can simple rankings of colleges and universities across many variables help consumers?
For example, is #12 Northwestern really an incrementally better university than #13 Johns Hopkins? And is #2 Amherst really an incrementally better liberal arts college than #3 Swarthmore? They surely are not – at least not categorically. Ranking schools on this type of continuous scale therefore makes very little sense. For some students, Northwestern is a better option than Johns Hopkins; for others, the opposite is true. The same goes for Amherst and Swarthmore.
So how do students make these decisions? They could use the wide array of data that USNWR puts forth, comparing schools on the characteristics that are most important to them, whether those are class size or graduation rate or academic reputation. Some students certainly do this. Many others, however, fall victim to the “rankings-as-gospel” syndrome. Swarthmore may be a better fit for their personality and interests, but they cannot get beyond the fact that Amherst is ranked higher, and a mismatch occurs. The solution to this dilemma is quite simple: remove the rankings, keep the numbers.
And so the critics are correct – USNWR seems to be at least partially to blame for mismatching and suboptimal decision-making. But USNWR is also at least partially responsible for the good decisions of those students who are able to look past simple rankings and delve deeper into the data. Since 1983, USNWR has provided crucial information to students in an easy-to-digest manner. For that, they deserve our (partial) thanks.
Slum-free cities in India? The implementation realities of central government policies
Renee Ho, MPA
In 2009, as part of an effort to promote “slum-free cities,” the Indian Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation (HUPA) announced a new initiative, the Rajiv Awas Yojana (RAY).[1] The RAY aims to upgrade and bring all slums within the formal housing system. It also intends to prevent the development of new slums by providing more affordable housing options and developing more land to meet growing needs. As a prerequisite to RAY funding, states must first assign legal title to slum-dwellers over their living space.
In theory and on paper, the RAY includes a number of positive measures for slum-dwellers, especially the emphasis on property rights and the lack of distinction between government-recognized and unrecognized slums. If implemented properly, it could result in improved housing and access to services for many more of the urban poor.
However, in India there is a large disconnect between policy and implementation. The RAY Guidelines for Slum-free City Planning lack appropriate measures to ensure that slum-dwellers’ interests will be protected against arbitrary eviction and relocation, especially when private builders are involved in slum re-development. Without strict provisions for community participation, transparency, monitoring, and accountability, there is a danger that the RAY could be used to grab valuable slum lands in the center of the city while relocating poorer residents to faraway locations.
Potential problems with the RAY can be broken down into several categories:
1) Lack of Monitoring Mechanisms and Transparency
---------------
Notes
[1] While there is no exact translation of "Rajiv Awas Yojana," in Hindi "yojana" means "scheme," which in India is the word used for government programs or policies. "Awas" is commonly used for yojanas dealing with housing related issues. While Rajiv literally translates as "lotus flower," we think the term refers to something else. In India there is also a program called Indira Awas Yojana, started in 1985, to provide housing for the rural poor. Indira was the name of a female prime minister of India named Indira Gandhi, who served from 1966-1977 and from 1980 until her assassination in 1984. Her son, Rajiv Ghandi, was also a prime minister and he served following his mother's death until 1989. (He was later assassinated in 1991.) Since the Indira Awas Yojana was launched under Rajiv's administration and was named for his mother, this program was most likely named after him.
In 2009, as part of an effort to promote “slum-free cities,” the Indian Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation (HUPA) announced a new initiative, the Rajiv Awas Yojana (RAY).[1] The RAY aims to upgrade and bring all slums within the formal housing system. It also intends to prevent the development of new slums by providing more affordable housing options and developing more land to meet growing needs. As a prerequisite to RAY funding, states must first assign legal title to slum-dwellers over their living space.
In theory and on paper, the RAY includes a number of positive measures for slum-dwellers, especially the emphasis on property rights and the lack of distinction between government-recognized and unrecognized slums. If implemented properly, it could result in improved housing and access to services for many more of the urban poor.
However, in India there is a large disconnect between policy and implementation. The RAY Guidelines for Slum-free City Planning lack appropriate measures to ensure that slum-dwellers’ interests will be protected against arbitrary eviction and relocation, especially when private builders are involved in slum re-development. Without strict provisions for community participation, transparency, monitoring, and accountability, there is a danger that the RAY could be used to grab valuable slum lands in the center of the city while relocating poorer residents to faraway locations.
Potential problems with the RAY can be broken down into several categories:
1) Lack of Monitoring Mechanisms and Transparency
- States must develop a Plan of Action (POA) that follows central government RAY guidelines in order to receive funding. The reality? Inadequate plans are approved and since the POAs are not statutory documents, they are legally non-binding on states.
- Transparency is not emphasized in the functioning of the RAY. For example, maps and survey information about slums are not mandated to be publicly available, nor is information such as detailed project reports, lists of beneficiaries, consultants involved, and names of members of RAY governing and planning committees. A similar lack of transparency has led to corruption in the Slum Rehabilitation Authority in Mumbai.
- Frequency: the RAY does not stipulate with what frequency data should be updated, and in what timeframe measurable slum improvements should be made. Because slums are dynamic, living communities, regular surveys are required to maintain data that is useful for policy and planning.
- Limits of Geographic Information Systems (GIS): Using satellite imagery alone to identify slums may result in smaller slums going unnoticed, particularly in cities like Chennai, which have a large number of smaller slum clusters rather than a few large slum clusters.
- Lack of participation in data collection: Although community participation is recommended for data collection in the POA guidelines, it is not mandatory. Already, in Chennai, surveys have begun, but it does not seem that non-governmental organizations /community-based organizations or individual slum-dwellers have been involved in collecting survey information.
- The RAY guidelines stipulate that the POA should emphasize Public-Private-Partnerships (PPP) in slum redevelopment. Private players implementing RAY will be allowed to make commercial use of some areas or sell a few flats at market rates. Learning from the case of Mumbai’s Slum Rehabilitation Authority, there is a particular need for institutional safeguards to prevent the mismanagement of land use and to protect the rights of vulnerable slum-dwellers.
- Thus far, it is unclear how the RAY will be unified. In the state of Tamil Nadu, the state Slum Clearance Board (TNSCB) has taken the planning lead but how the TNSCB will work with other agencies with the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority, the Town and Country Planning Department, the Tamil Nadu Housing Board, community groups, and the new “slum-free city technical cells” is unclear. Furthermore, once a Property Rights to Slum-Dwellers Act is passed, there will be additional agencies to coordinate around the question of land tenure.
- GIS-based slum planning, planning to prevent slums, and providing security of tenure to the poor are all complex tasks for which cities and housing agencies have little experience. Even with some money for technical consultants, it is unclear whether municipalities will have enough technical capacity to implement the RAY.
---------------
Notes
[1] While there is no exact translation of "Rajiv Awas Yojana," in Hindi "yojana" means "scheme," which in India is the word used for government programs or policies. "Awas" is commonly used for yojanas dealing with housing related issues. While Rajiv literally translates as "lotus flower," we think the term refers to something else. In India there is also a program called Indira Awas Yojana, started in 1985, to provide housing for the rural poor. Indira was the name of a female prime minister of India named Indira Gandhi, who served from 1966-1977 and from 1980 until her assassination in 1984. Her son, Rajiv Ghandi, was also a prime minister and he served following his mother's death until 1989. (He was later assassinated in 1991.) Since the Indira Awas Yojana was launched under Rajiv's administration and was named for his mother, this program was most likely named after him.
The Leadership Merry-Go-Round: The mystery behind the ever-changing Japanese prime ministers
Masayuki Kameda, MPA
Former Brazilian president Lula da Silva once joked about Japanese prime ministers that you say “good morning” to one and “good afternoon” to another. Granted, it’s an exaggeration, but Japan is the only country in which the head of state delivering a speech at the annual UN General Assembly has been different in three consecutive years: Taro Aso in 2008, Yukio Hatoyama in 2009, and Naoto Kan in 2010. And this year, it will be the newly appointed Yoshihiko Noda, the sixth prime minister that Japan has seen in the last five years.
While many point out Japan’s political culture of habatsu (inner party factions) or the fickle public and the media as the main reasons for the instability of Japanese leadership, one fundamental factor that is often overlooked is the short election cycles of the house and party leadership.
In a way, clinging onto the position of prime minister in Japan is like having to compete in and continually win a popularity contest held every one or two years. The average time between national house elections are roughly two years, with ballots cast every four years for the lower house and every three years for half of the the upper house. Each election has a direct impact on the longevity of the prime minister, as the cabinet (headed by the prime minister) is chosen by members of both houses following the election. If the ruling party loses in the lower house elections, the opposing party naturally chooses a different house member from among its ranks to serve as the new leader. This occurred in September 2009 when Taro Aso of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) was replaced by Yukio Hatoyama of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) following a general election which resulted in a historic landslide victory for the DPJ.
And if the ruling party loses in the upper house elections, even though by law the prime minister doesn’t have to change (since the lower house – still controlled by the ruling party – can override the decision of the upper house in choosing the leader), the prime minister is often coerced to resign by his or her own party members as a way of taking the responsibility for the defeat. For instance, Shinzo Abe (prime minister from September 2006 to September 2007) stepped down a month after his party’s devastating loss in the upper house election, facing a stalemate in the legislature and criticisms from both inside and outside his party.
Moreover, the prime minister doesn’t even have to lose an election in order to be replaced. Merely the fact that an election is coming up creates incentives to oust the prime minister. Sometimes, before a national election the prime minister is pressured by his or her own party members to step down if the cabinet’s approval ratings are too low. This way, the party can go into an election with a more popular leader. This occurred twice in the past five years. Facing plummeting approval ratings, Yasuo Fukuda (prime minister from September 2007 to September 2008) submitted to voices in his party which argued that they will not be able to succeed in the lower house election scheduled to take place within a year with him as the head. The same happened to Yukio Hatoyama (prime minister from September 2009 to June 2010), resigning just one month before the upper house election.
In addition to these national elections, each party has its own rules for electing its party leader. For instance, the term of the party leader for the DPJ, the current ruling party, is two years. And if the leader steps down before the term expires and an election is held to replace him or her, the newly elected leader only serves the remainder of the predecessor’s term. For instance, the new Prime Minister Noda’s term is limited to the remaining one year that he succeeded from former Prime Minister Kan’s term. If he is to serve for over a year, he will have to survive another party leadership election that is scheduled to be held next year. And even if he does succeed in defending his position in a party leadership election in 2012, he will have to face a general election of both houses in the summer of 2013.
Of course, critics are correct that the habatsu and the capricious public also carry some responsibility. In this unhealthy political climate, even if election cycles were elongated, things may still remain the same. After all, the recent change in leadership was brought forth not by an immediate election but because of Kan’s inability to get things done. Plunging approval ratings, interparty power struggle, and the legislative stalemate resulting from a divided parliament all made it extremely difficult for Kan to continue.
However, it is also true that short election cycles have been and will continue to be an obstacle for any prime minister to stay in office for an extended period. And while political culture is extremely hard to change, the election cycles can be revised. In order to end Japan’s unfortunate record at the UN General Assembly, and more importantly, to allow the prime minister to develop better long-term strategy for Japan as well as close relationships with other world leaders, this fractious election system must be reconsidered urgently.
Former Brazilian president Lula da Silva once joked about Japanese prime ministers that you say “good morning” to one and “good afternoon” to another. Granted, it’s an exaggeration, but Japan is the only country in which the head of state delivering a speech at the annual UN General Assembly has been different in three consecutive years: Taro Aso in 2008, Yukio Hatoyama in 2009, and Naoto Kan in 2010. And this year, it will be the newly appointed Yoshihiko Noda, the sixth prime minister that Japan has seen in the last five years.
While many point out Japan’s political culture of habatsu (inner party factions) or the fickle public and the media as the main reasons for the instability of Japanese leadership, one fundamental factor that is often overlooked is the short election cycles of the house and party leadership.
In a way, clinging onto the position of prime minister in Japan is like having to compete in and continually win a popularity contest held every one or two years. The average time between national house elections are roughly two years, with ballots cast every four years for the lower house and every three years for half of the the upper house. Each election has a direct impact on the longevity of the prime minister, as the cabinet (headed by the prime minister) is chosen by members of both houses following the election. If the ruling party loses in the lower house elections, the opposing party naturally chooses a different house member from among its ranks to serve as the new leader. This occurred in September 2009 when Taro Aso of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) was replaced by Yukio Hatoyama of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) following a general election which resulted in a historic landslide victory for the DPJ.
And if the ruling party loses in the upper house elections, even though by law the prime minister doesn’t have to change (since the lower house – still controlled by the ruling party – can override the decision of the upper house in choosing the leader), the prime minister is often coerced to resign by his or her own party members as a way of taking the responsibility for the defeat. For instance, Shinzo Abe (prime minister from September 2006 to September 2007) stepped down a month after his party’s devastating loss in the upper house election, facing a stalemate in the legislature and criticisms from both inside and outside his party.
Moreover, the prime minister doesn’t even have to lose an election in order to be replaced. Merely the fact that an election is coming up creates incentives to oust the prime minister. Sometimes, before a national election the prime minister is pressured by his or her own party members to step down if the cabinet’s approval ratings are too low. This way, the party can go into an election with a more popular leader. This occurred twice in the past five years. Facing plummeting approval ratings, Yasuo Fukuda (prime minister from September 2007 to September 2008) submitted to voices in his party which argued that they will not be able to succeed in the lower house election scheduled to take place within a year with him as the head. The same happened to Yukio Hatoyama (prime minister from September 2009 to June 2010), resigning just one month before the upper house election.
In addition to these national elections, each party has its own rules for electing its party leader. For instance, the term of the party leader for the DPJ, the current ruling party, is two years. And if the leader steps down before the term expires and an election is held to replace him or her, the newly elected leader only serves the remainder of the predecessor’s term. For instance, the new Prime Minister Noda’s term is limited to the remaining one year that he succeeded from former Prime Minister Kan’s term. If he is to serve for over a year, he will have to survive another party leadership election that is scheduled to be held next year. And even if he does succeed in defending his position in a party leadership election in 2012, he will have to face a general election of both houses in the summer of 2013.
Of course, critics are correct that the habatsu and the capricious public also carry some responsibility. In this unhealthy political climate, even if election cycles were elongated, things may still remain the same. After all, the recent change in leadership was brought forth not by an immediate election but because of Kan’s inability to get things done. Plunging approval ratings, interparty power struggle, and the legislative stalemate resulting from a divided parliament all made it extremely difficult for Kan to continue.
However, it is also true that short election cycles have been and will continue to be an obstacle for any prime minister to stay in office for an extended period. And while political culture is extremely hard to change, the election cycles can be revised. In order to end Japan’s unfortunate record at the UN General Assembly, and more importantly, to allow the prime minister to develop better long-term strategy for Japan as well as close relationships with other world leaders, this fractious election system must be reconsidered urgently.
Friday, September 23, 2011
Buying local: Will the US troop pullout pull the afghan out from under the Afghan economy?
Andrew Shaver, MPA
American military officials have initiated plans to withdraw the first contingent of US forces from Afghanistan this year despite the Afghan government’s dependence upon US operations for its own security and political survival. No less important, though infrequently mentioned, is the very uncertain economic future for Afghanistan in the wake of American withdrawal. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee cautioned earlier this summer that, without proper planning, Afghanistan “could suffer a severe economic depression when foreign troops leave…” Meanwhile, the Congressionally-mandated Commission on Wartime Contracting (an independent, bipartisan group established to study wartime contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan) warned in its final report this summer that many social and security programs developed in Afghanistan by the US government likely cannot be sustained by the government of Afghanistan.
While significant investigation has been done into the nature and possible effects of the significant State, Defense, and USAID spending in Afghanistan, similar scrutiny has not been applied to a major Department of Defense (DoD) program established in 2006 under which many billions of dollars have been spent on goods and services procured from Afghan firms.
Last month, Defense officials provided me with data recently made public on all contractual obligations made to Afghan firms by US Central Command’s primary contracting entity. The data are impressive. Based on commitments already made this year, DoD is on track to make more than $2 billion in obligations with Afghan firms by in fiscal year 2011. (To put matters in perspective, Afghanistan’s 2010 gross domestic product was roughly $27 billion.) While the US military begins to reduce its presence in Afghanistan, CentCom spending on goods and services provided by Afghan firms continues to increase significantly – obligations this fiscal year are 100% greater than 2009 and are set to exceed 2010 obligations by more than half a billion dollars.
Policymakers should consider possible effects on Afghanistan’s security conditions of terminating, quickly or slowly, billions of dollars in business with local firms. Has DoD business with local firms created industries that will remain functional in the years following America’s withdrawal? Has military spending created bubbles of economic activity that threaten to implode as the war effort grinds to a halt, leaving ranks of young males unemployed and susceptible to terrorist recruiting?
It is possible that the effect will be minimal. Of the roughly $1.7 billion already committed this fiscal year, nearly $1 billion are slated for purchases of various commodities. Because contracting guidelines do not require that Afghan businesses satisfy strict local-content or local-hiring requirements, little deters these firms from importing such commodities from abroad. Thus, the cessation of spending in Afghanistan may do little more than sound the death knell for an inflated market of Afghan middlemen. My discussions with contracting officials deployed in theater tend to corroborate this possibility. However, no formal study has been undertaken in this regard.
However, on the services side, data indicates that there may be jobs at stake, albeit within a somewhat narrow set of industries. Of the remaining approximately $700 million obligated this fiscal year, most are designated for the provision of “professional, administrative and management support services,” “utilities and housekeeping services,” and “transportation, travel, and relocation services.” Central Command also reported recently employing over 46,000 Afghans and estimated that a further 18,000 Afghans are employed as private security contractor personnel. Granted, many of these jobs may remain in place following a draw-down. But research into the way such industries have developed through US military spending is needed to provide policymakers with better understanding of how the timing and magnitude of troop withdrawal might ultimately affect Afghanistan’s economy.
Getting at such a question may not be as challenging as might otherwise be the case. Last year, now-retired General David Petraeus *85 *87 and Admiral Mike Mullen established Task Force 2010 to examine whether the Department’s contractual spending in Afghanistan is undermining efforts to stabilize the country. So far, this mandate has translated into investigations into whether funds have fallen into the hands of insurgency members, culminating with this summer’s finding that that the Taliban has extracted rents on US transportation spending. Yet, as an organization created to “follow the money,” as Petraeus testified to Congress, Task Force 2010 not only enjoys senior-level support but employs the type of civilian and military experts qualified to consider the broader effects of major contract spending on the country and the implications for its withdrawal. If properly resourced and directed, the task force could offer policymakers a unique way forward. Let’s hope.
A version of this article was published earlier this month by the Small Wars Journal blog, and is accessible here.
American military officials have initiated plans to withdraw the first contingent of US forces from Afghanistan this year despite the Afghan government’s dependence upon US operations for its own security and political survival. No less important, though infrequently mentioned, is the very uncertain economic future for Afghanistan in the wake of American withdrawal. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee cautioned earlier this summer that, without proper planning, Afghanistan “could suffer a severe economic depression when foreign troops leave…” Meanwhile, the Congressionally-mandated Commission on Wartime Contracting (an independent, bipartisan group established to study wartime contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan) warned in its final report this summer that many social and security programs developed in Afghanistan by the US government likely cannot be sustained by the government of Afghanistan.
While significant investigation has been done into the nature and possible effects of the significant State, Defense, and USAID spending in Afghanistan, similar scrutiny has not been applied to a major Department of Defense (DoD) program established in 2006 under which many billions of dollars have been spent on goods and services procured from Afghan firms.
Last month, Defense officials provided me with data recently made public on all contractual obligations made to Afghan firms by US Central Command’s primary contracting entity. The data are impressive. Based on commitments already made this year, DoD is on track to make more than $2 billion in obligations with Afghan firms by in fiscal year 2011. (To put matters in perspective, Afghanistan’s 2010 gross domestic product was roughly $27 billion.) While the US military begins to reduce its presence in Afghanistan, CentCom spending on goods and services provided by Afghan firms continues to increase significantly – obligations this fiscal year are 100% greater than 2009 and are set to exceed 2010 obligations by more than half a billion dollars.
Policymakers should consider possible effects on Afghanistan’s security conditions of terminating, quickly or slowly, billions of dollars in business with local firms. Has DoD business with local firms created industries that will remain functional in the years following America’s withdrawal? Has military spending created bubbles of economic activity that threaten to implode as the war effort grinds to a halt, leaving ranks of young males unemployed and susceptible to terrorist recruiting?
It is possible that the effect will be minimal. Of the roughly $1.7 billion already committed this fiscal year, nearly $1 billion are slated for purchases of various commodities. Because contracting guidelines do not require that Afghan businesses satisfy strict local-content or local-hiring requirements, little deters these firms from importing such commodities from abroad. Thus, the cessation of spending in Afghanistan may do little more than sound the death knell for an inflated market of Afghan middlemen. My discussions with contracting officials deployed in theater tend to corroborate this possibility. However, no formal study has been undertaken in this regard.
However, on the services side, data indicates that there may be jobs at stake, albeit within a somewhat narrow set of industries. Of the remaining approximately $700 million obligated this fiscal year, most are designated for the provision of “professional, administrative and management support services,” “utilities and housekeeping services,” and “transportation, travel, and relocation services.” Central Command also reported recently employing over 46,000 Afghans and estimated that a further 18,000 Afghans are employed as private security contractor personnel. Granted, many of these jobs may remain in place following a draw-down. But research into the way such industries have developed through US military spending is needed to provide policymakers with better understanding of how the timing and magnitude of troop withdrawal might ultimately affect Afghanistan’s economy.
Getting at such a question may not be as challenging as might otherwise be the case. Last year, now-retired General David Petraeus *85 *87 and Admiral Mike Mullen established Task Force 2010 to examine whether the Department’s contractual spending in Afghanistan is undermining efforts to stabilize the country. So far, this mandate has translated into investigations into whether funds have fallen into the hands of insurgency members, culminating with this summer’s finding that that the Taliban has extracted rents on US transportation spending. Yet, as an organization created to “follow the money,” as Petraeus testified to Congress, Task Force 2010 not only enjoys senior-level support but employs the type of civilian and military experts qualified to consider the broader effects of major contract spending on the country and the implications for its withdrawal. If properly resourced and directed, the task force could offer policymakers a unique way forward. Let’s hope.
A version of this article was published earlier this month by the Small Wars Journal blog, and is accessible here.
Smells Like Teen Xenophobia: Chinese “Angry Youth” and anti-Japanese nationalism
Keqin Wei, MPA
In spite of the growing economic cooperation and cultural exchange between China and Japan in recent years, the number of “Angry Youth” in China is also rising commensurately. The phenomenon of “Angry Youth” refers to young Chinese ultra-nationalists with a visceral hatred of Japan. Since most “Angry Youth” were born after the 1980s, they did not live through the Sino-Japanese War of the 1940s, but nevertheless demonstrate much stronger anti-Japanese sentiment than former generations. Importantly, these youth are generally highly educated and children of the internet age – blogs and chat rooms are often the repository for their anti-Japanese polemics. While there are many reasons for the growing numbers of “Angry Youth,” the most salient are the censored media in China and the way history is taught to students.
“The Modern History of China” is an important course in both Chinese middle school and high school. Stereotypes aside about China’s infatuation with inculcating math and science, great efforts have been made to teach students their national history from the Opium War of the 19th century to the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. Particular concentration is placed on the eight-year Sino-Japanese War in the 1930s-40s. This curriculum is also included on important exams, such as the College Entrance Exam, in order to encourage students to spend more time learning history. For most Chinese young people, having received the compulsory education, Japanese wartime atrocities are described in such vivid details that it becomes deeply ingrained in their memories. In comparison, other aspects of Japan, such as its culture, economy, and politics, are largely neglected.
Furthermore, the internet provides biased reports of modern-day Japan by amplifying its conflicts with China and reiterating tense historical issues. Just a few months ago, if one searched for “Japan” on Baidu, the most popular Chinese internet search engine, the top three news hits were: “Crisis in Fukushima,” “Japan claims its sovereignty over Diaoyu Islands,” and “Japanese history textbooks deny the Nanjing Massacre.” If it were not for the disaster in Japan, there would also very likely be articles criticizing the “basic quality” of Japanese people among the top news articles. As these “Angry Youth” spend their leisure time on the internet and browsing the websites that host such articles, this kind of information is constantly repeated, which intensifies the stereotype of Japanese brutality and hostility towards China.
Psychological research shows that people often make judgments based on accessible information. Most “Angry Youth” don’t have the opportunity to visit Japan, so the information available to them from textbooks and media is often the main resource to make their judgments. Their attitudes towards Japan are biased based on these historical memories and prejudiced news source.
Social norms also help shape people’s behavior, especially in a country like China which has a strong tradition of collectivism. As framed by former PRC president Jiang Zemin: “Forgetting the humiliating Chinese modern history means betraying your country.” In this environment, forgetting or even forgiving Japanese aggression is tantamount to treason. A second example comes from a popular Chinese movie about the Nanjing Massacre, “Nanjing, Nanjing” (2009). The Nanjing Massacre of 1937 is widely regarded as evidence of Japanese soldiers’ brutality and is still a hot topic given current Japanese leaders’ reluctance to apologize for its occupation of China. Upon the film’s release, one influential movie critic was quoted as follows: “You are not qualified to be Chinese if you do not watch this movie.” The assertion that failure to appreciate a movie about Japanese wartime brutality means losing one’s Chinese identity puts extreme pressure on those who do not plan to see the film.
While these social norms partly explain the expansion of anti-Japanese nationalism, why does the anti-Japanese sentiment in the “Angry Youth” surpass that of other age groups, including older generations who actually lived through the brutality of occupation?
One would not be surprised to find out that peer pressure plays a large role in shaping this attitude for teens. The Chinese internet, which is notorious for its censorship of sensitive political topics, has no problem with the proliferation of nationalist comments. Allowing the “Angry Youth” to be the only outspoken adolescent political group in the country gives the false impression that they are the only politically-oriented youth in China. When “Angry Youth” spread their anti-Japanese comments on internet, people their age with similar education backgrounds tend to take this movement as a reference group, and modify their own attitudes accordingly.
Nationalism proves to be an effective tool for totalitarian states to suppress dissidents and maintain social stability. To date, it seems China has been successful at stoking nationalist themes and training “Angry Youth” to vent their frustrations in politically-acceptable directions. Unfortunately, it seems that these “Angry Youth” have already begun to transform their attitudes into behaviors, as evidenced by frequent anti-Japan demonstrations that have taken place since 2004. One way to assuage the hostile attitudes towards Japan is to expand the information channels about Japan, by introducing Japanese cartoons and movies in China in order to show different aspects of the island nation; and most importantly, to revise Chinese modern history textbooks to show the Chinese people that modern Chinese history is much richer than an eight-year war with its neighbor.
Thanks to Eddie Skolnick for his comments and editing.
In spite of the growing economic cooperation and cultural exchange between China and Japan in recent years, the number of “Angry Youth” in China is also rising commensurately. The phenomenon of “Angry Youth” refers to young Chinese ultra-nationalists with a visceral hatred of Japan. Since most “Angry Youth” were born after the 1980s, they did not live through the Sino-Japanese War of the 1940s, but nevertheless demonstrate much stronger anti-Japanese sentiment than former generations. Importantly, these youth are generally highly educated and children of the internet age – blogs and chat rooms are often the repository for their anti-Japanese polemics. While there are many reasons for the growing numbers of “Angry Youth,” the most salient are the censored media in China and the way history is taught to students.
“The Modern History of China” is an important course in both Chinese middle school and high school. Stereotypes aside about China’s infatuation with inculcating math and science, great efforts have been made to teach students their national history from the Opium War of the 19th century to the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. Particular concentration is placed on the eight-year Sino-Japanese War in the 1930s-40s. This curriculum is also included on important exams, such as the College Entrance Exam, in order to encourage students to spend more time learning history. For most Chinese young people, having received the compulsory education, Japanese wartime atrocities are described in such vivid details that it becomes deeply ingrained in their memories. In comparison, other aspects of Japan, such as its culture, economy, and politics, are largely neglected.
Furthermore, the internet provides biased reports of modern-day Japan by amplifying its conflicts with China and reiterating tense historical issues. Just a few months ago, if one searched for “Japan” on Baidu, the most popular Chinese internet search engine, the top three news hits were: “Crisis in Fukushima,” “Japan claims its sovereignty over Diaoyu Islands,” and “Japanese history textbooks deny the Nanjing Massacre.” If it were not for the disaster in Japan, there would also very likely be articles criticizing the “basic quality” of Japanese people among the top news articles. As these “Angry Youth” spend their leisure time on the internet and browsing the websites that host such articles, this kind of information is constantly repeated, which intensifies the stereotype of Japanese brutality and hostility towards China.
Psychological research shows that people often make judgments based on accessible information. Most “Angry Youth” don’t have the opportunity to visit Japan, so the information available to them from textbooks and media is often the main resource to make their judgments. Their attitudes towards Japan are biased based on these historical memories and prejudiced news source.
Social norms also help shape people’s behavior, especially in a country like China which has a strong tradition of collectivism. As framed by former PRC president Jiang Zemin: “Forgetting the humiliating Chinese modern history means betraying your country.” In this environment, forgetting or even forgiving Japanese aggression is tantamount to treason. A second example comes from a popular Chinese movie about the Nanjing Massacre, “Nanjing, Nanjing” (2009). The Nanjing Massacre of 1937 is widely regarded as evidence of Japanese soldiers’ brutality and is still a hot topic given current Japanese leaders’ reluctance to apologize for its occupation of China. Upon the film’s release, one influential movie critic was quoted as follows: “You are not qualified to be Chinese if you do not watch this movie.” The assertion that failure to appreciate a movie about Japanese wartime brutality means losing one’s Chinese identity puts extreme pressure on those who do not plan to see the film.
While these social norms partly explain the expansion of anti-Japanese nationalism, why does the anti-Japanese sentiment in the “Angry Youth” surpass that of other age groups, including older generations who actually lived through the brutality of occupation?
One would not be surprised to find out that peer pressure plays a large role in shaping this attitude for teens. The Chinese internet, which is notorious for its censorship of sensitive political topics, has no problem with the proliferation of nationalist comments. Allowing the “Angry Youth” to be the only outspoken adolescent political group in the country gives the false impression that they are the only politically-oriented youth in China. When “Angry Youth” spread their anti-Japanese comments on internet, people their age with similar education backgrounds tend to take this movement as a reference group, and modify their own attitudes accordingly.
Nationalism proves to be an effective tool for totalitarian states to suppress dissidents and maintain social stability. To date, it seems China has been successful at stoking nationalist themes and training “Angry Youth” to vent their frustrations in politically-acceptable directions. Unfortunately, it seems that these “Angry Youth” have already begun to transform their attitudes into behaviors, as evidenced by frequent anti-Japan demonstrations that have taken place since 2004. One way to assuage the hostile attitudes towards Japan is to expand the information channels about Japan, by introducing Japanese cartoons and movies in China in order to show different aspects of the island nation; and most importantly, to revise Chinese modern history textbooks to show the Chinese people that modern Chinese history is much richer than an eight-year war with its neighbor.
Thanks to Eddie Skolnick for his comments and editing.
"Randomized control trials" on trial: Evaluating the efficacy of RCTs
Jake Velker, MPA
Are randomized trials the way to finally start making a dent in reducing poverty, after years of hopeful thinking and disappointing results? Does this tool for evidence-based policymaking hold the key for practitioners to determine which poverty reduction programs work and which don’t? These questions motivate two recent books published by researchers who are at the vanguard of the randomized control trials (RCT) movement: More Than Good Intentions by Dean Karlan and Jacob Appel of Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) and Poor Economics by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL). They deliberately introduce randomization in the implementation of anti-poverty measures to provide confidence in the programs’ efficacy (or lack thereof).
The results thus far have been dramatic and not always intuitive: microfinance is less effective than we hoped [1]; free bed nets are used more often (and prevent more malaria) than those that cost money.[2] IPA and J-PAL are currently involved in dozens of trials and are generally credited with bringing an unprecedented level of rigor to the evaluation of development—a field normally dominated by grand theories and polemics.
Enough praise has been heaped on the “randomistas” that I feel confident I can focus on the criticisms of their methodology without sounding uncharitable.[3]
The first criticism—leveled forcefully by Princeton’s Angus Deaton—is that randomized trials do not help us in any systematic way to gain an understanding of why interventions work.[4] In this sense, IPA and J-PAL are part of a broader trend in economic research that eschews theory in favor of real-world applications and problem-solving. This is irksome for many economists, particularly those who believe that poverty cannot be solved without a broader accounting of the mechanisms that keep people trapped in poverty. Randomized trials are beginning to test theoretical frameworks more directly, but there is still much progress to be made.
The most relevant criticism, however, is political. IPA and J-PAL economists have been accused of ignoring the institutional constraints against which their interventions would inevitably contend if scaled up. Often, research from randomized trials offers a conclusion like “we find that intervention X lowers Y disease transmission by Z percent.” While it is extremely helpful to have confidence in the efficacy of a treatment, glaring questions remain. Does the program work when it is implemented by a weak bureaucracy, rather than university-trained researchers? At scale, who will be responsible for administering the recommended program? What are their incentives to perform? Where will the money come from? If the intervention is so successful, were there good reasons it wasn’t tried before?
A troubling case in point involves one of the most heralded studies from the RCT movement to date. Working in Kenya, economists Michael Kremer and Ted Miguel found that providing de-worming medicine to students boosted school attendance cost-effectively.[5] Spurred by their research, the Kenyan government committed to making de-worming medicine available to more than 3,000,000 of its primary school children in 2009. But the policy was recently discontinued due to a dispute between the Kenyan government and international donors over corruption and the administration of education funding.[6] It should go without saying that for the ultra-poor, these sorts of bureaucratic obstacles are the norm, rather than the exception.
If economics is just supply and demand, the work of IPA and J-PAL has focused thus far mostly on demand. It is difficult to quantitatively study governance—imagine what an RCT studying a poor country’s provincial governance, for example, might look like—and even harder to actually improve the quality of basic services in developing countries. So many of the interventions RCTs have found to be effective involve classic public goods, which by definition remain under-provisioned by private markets. But the bureaucracies of developing countries are generally ineffective, if not downright corrupt. This is where economics loses its relevance and institutions and leadership rear their ugly heads.
These problems have not been amenable to ever-more creative randomized trials. In fact, many of the most celebrated finds of the RCT movement are relative “no-brainers.” Who, after all, would argue against treating poor school children for intestinal worms? Esther Duflo and her colleagues have said that we do not know what works. Many would respond that we know perfectly well what works; but do not know how to do it. Perhaps the real questions start once an intervention has been proven to work.
Randomistas respond to this critique as follows. First, it was never their ambition to overhaul the political economy of the developing world. The fact that they have found real evidence of effective interventions is in itself a major accomplishment. They believe that their approach can improve lives even in discouraging political settings. They are not promising a sweeping social revolution, but rather a “quiet revolution” of incremental gains. And even critics will concede that though the modesty of this approach may be unsatisfying, it is nonetheless an improvement on the empty promises all too frequent in the development world.
------------------------
References
[1] Abhijit Banerjeey, Esther Duflo, Rachel Glennerster, and Cynthia Kinnan, “The miracle of microfinance? Evidence from a randomized evaluation,” Working Paper (unpublished), May 2009.
[2] Jessica Cohen and Pascaline Dupas, “Free Distribution or Cost-Sharing? Evidence from a Randomized Malaria Prevention Experiment,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 125:1, 2010.
[3] For examples of such praise, see: Ian Parker, “The Poverty Lab: Transforming development economics, one experiment at a time,” New Yorker, May 2010; James Crabtree, “Attested Development,” Financial Times, April 2011; William Easterly, “Measuring How and Why Aid Works – or Doesn’t,” Wall Street Journal, April 2011; Ben Goldacre, “How can you tell if a policy is working? Run a trial,” The Guardian, May 2011; and Nicholas Kristof, “Getting Smart on Aid,” New York Times, May 2011.
[4] Angus Deaton, “Instruments, Randomization, and Learning about Development,” Journal of Economic Literature, Vol. 48:2, June 2010.
[5] Edward Miguel and Michael Kremer, “Worms: Identifying Impacts on Education and Health in the Presence of Treatment Externalities,” Econometrica, Vol. 72: 1, January 2004.
[6] Justin Sandefur, “Held Hostage: Funding for a Proven Success in Global Development on Hold in Kenya,” Global Development: Views from the Center blog, Center for Global Development, April 2011.
Are randomized trials the way to finally start making a dent in reducing poverty, after years of hopeful thinking and disappointing results? Does this tool for evidence-based policymaking hold the key for practitioners to determine which poverty reduction programs work and which don’t? These questions motivate two recent books published by researchers who are at the vanguard of the randomized control trials (RCT) movement: More Than Good Intentions by Dean Karlan and Jacob Appel of Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) and Poor Economics by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL). They deliberately introduce randomization in the implementation of anti-poverty measures to provide confidence in the programs’ efficacy (or lack thereof).
The results thus far have been dramatic and not always intuitive: microfinance is less effective than we hoped [1]; free bed nets are used more often (and prevent more malaria) than those that cost money.[2] IPA and J-PAL are currently involved in dozens of trials and are generally credited with bringing an unprecedented level of rigor to the evaluation of development—a field normally dominated by grand theories and polemics.
Enough praise has been heaped on the “randomistas” that I feel confident I can focus on the criticisms of their methodology without sounding uncharitable.[3]
The first criticism—leveled forcefully by Princeton’s Angus Deaton—is that randomized trials do not help us in any systematic way to gain an understanding of why interventions work.[4] In this sense, IPA and J-PAL are part of a broader trend in economic research that eschews theory in favor of real-world applications and problem-solving. This is irksome for many economists, particularly those who believe that poverty cannot be solved without a broader accounting of the mechanisms that keep people trapped in poverty. Randomized trials are beginning to test theoretical frameworks more directly, but there is still much progress to be made.
The most relevant criticism, however, is political. IPA and J-PAL economists have been accused of ignoring the institutional constraints against which their interventions would inevitably contend if scaled up. Often, research from randomized trials offers a conclusion like “we find that intervention X lowers Y disease transmission by Z percent.” While it is extremely helpful to have confidence in the efficacy of a treatment, glaring questions remain. Does the program work when it is implemented by a weak bureaucracy, rather than university-trained researchers? At scale, who will be responsible for administering the recommended program? What are their incentives to perform? Where will the money come from? If the intervention is so successful, were there good reasons it wasn’t tried before?
A troubling case in point involves one of the most heralded studies from the RCT movement to date. Working in Kenya, economists Michael Kremer and Ted Miguel found that providing de-worming medicine to students boosted school attendance cost-effectively.[5] Spurred by their research, the Kenyan government committed to making de-worming medicine available to more than 3,000,000 of its primary school children in 2009. But the policy was recently discontinued due to a dispute between the Kenyan government and international donors over corruption and the administration of education funding.[6] It should go without saying that for the ultra-poor, these sorts of bureaucratic obstacles are the norm, rather than the exception.
If economics is just supply and demand, the work of IPA and J-PAL has focused thus far mostly on demand. It is difficult to quantitatively study governance—imagine what an RCT studying a poor country’s provincial governance, for example, might look like—and even harder to actually improve the quality of basic services in developing countries. So many of the interventions RCTs have found to be effective involve classic public goods, which by definition remain under-provisioned by private markets. But the bureaucracies of developing countries are generally ineffective, if not downright corrupt. This is where economics loses its relevance and institutions and leadership rear their ugly heads.
These problems have not been amenable to ever-more creative randomized trials. In fact, many of the most celebrated finds of the RCT movement are relative “no-brainers.” Who, after all, would argue against treating poor school children for intestinal worms? Esther Duflo and her colleagues have said that we do not know what works. Many would respond that we know perfectly well what works; but do not know how to do it. Perhaps the real questions start once an intervention has been proven to work.
Randomistas respond to this critique as follows. First, it was never their ambition to overhaul the political economy of the developing world. The fact that they have found real evidence of effective interventions is in itself a major accomplishment. They believe that their approach can improve lives even in discouraging political settings. They are not promising a sweeping social revolution, but rather a “quiet revolution” of incremental gains. And even critics will concede that though the modesty of this approach may be unsatisfying, it is nonetheless an improvement on the empty promises all too frequent in the development world.
------------------------
References
[1] Abhijit Banerjeey, Esther Duflo, Rachel Glennerster, and Cynthia Kinnan, “The miracle of microfinance? Evidence from a randomized evaluation,” Working Paper (unpublished), May 2009.
[2] Jessica Cohen and Pascaline Dupas, “Free Distribution or Cost-Sharing? Evidence from a Randomized Malaria Prevention Experiment,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 125:1, 2010.
[3] For examples of such praise, see: Ian Parker, “The Poverty Lab: Transforming development economics, one experiment at a time,” New Yorker, May 2010; James Crabtree, “Attested Development,” Financial Times, April 2011; William Easterly, “Measuring How and Why Aid Works – or Doesn’t,” Wall Street Journal, April 2011; Ben Goldacre, “How can you tell if a policy is working? Run a trial,” The Guardian, May 2011; and Nicholas Kristof, “Getting Smart on Aid,” New York Times, May 2011.
[4] Angus Deaton, “Instruments, Randomization, and Learning about Development,” Journal of Economic Literature, Vol. 48:2, June 2010.
[5] Edward Miguel and Michael Kremer, “Worms: Identifying Impacts on Education and Health in the Presence of Treatment Externalities,” Econometrica, Vol. 72: 1, January 2004.
[6] Justin Sandefur, “Held Hostage: Funding for a Proven Success in Global Development on Hold in Kenya,” Global Development: Views from the Center blog, Center for Global Development, April 2011.
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