The failure of educational reforms in developing countries

This chapter reviews current research on educational reforms in developing countries to support my argument that Western-designed reforms, in general, and neoliberal reforms, in particular, are incompatible with the major cultural and social characteristics of these countries. Generally speaking, despite educational reforms borrowed from Anglo-American nations in recent years, student achievement in many developing countries is still very low, and the rate of student dropout is high. Factors such as the teacher’s status, a highly politicized public administration, corruption, and centralized decision-making might account for the failure of many educational reforms and the conservative features of schooling and teaching. The attempt to transfer Western-designed ideas to the schools in developing countries, regardless of local contexts and needs, cultural beliefs and conceptions of education, and social structures, seems to be ineffective