Neoliberalism and Madrassas: An Unholy Connection

Madrassas (religious schools) have gained notoriety in the post 9-11 world as havens for and training centers for Islamic militants. However, there is little understanding of these schools and hardly any literature that looks at how these schools are perhaps an indirect consequence of structural adjustment policies that are dictated by the IMF and the World Bank. The purpose of this short essay is to explore this link. The argument that I attempt to make here can be summarized as follows: Neoliberal policies, through structural adjustment programs (SAPs), advocate a decrease in public spending on education and a rise in privatization of education. This makes it harder for low-income families to send their children to private schools. Madrassas offer free education (including books etc. and often also free room and board). These appeal to the parents from low income households who are unable to raise funds for other types of education. Thus, neoliberal policies and SAPs indirectly contribute to a rise in enrollments in madrassas.

In order to make this argument, I will:
1) identify the neoliberal policies and perceptions of public education,
2) 2) document the decrease in government spending on public education,
3) 3) demonstrate the link between household income and preference of type of schooling, and
4) 4) show a timeline that shows that the introduction of SAPs corresponds with an increase in the number of madrassas. In order to keep this focus on the relationship between SAPs and madrassas, I will refrain from a discussion of the syllabi, culture, or politics of madrassa education (for a discussion of this see Rahman, 2004).

Stromquist (2002), among others, points out that neoliberal policies use structural adjustment programs (SAPs) as one of their key economic tools. She points out that the goal of these programs is not to decrease socio-economic inequalities between people, but of “finidng institutional mechanisms capable of paying back the debt efficiently… SAPs have been remarkably uniform in their proposed solutions: liberalization of the economy, reduced government budgets, privatization of state enterprises and services such as education and health...” In the case of Pakistan, the SAP comes in the guise of Social Action Program. This Social Action Program in Pakistan, like SAPs in other countries, encourages privatization of education (and a reduction in state funding of education). It also contributes to a negative image of the public schools and labels them as failures. For example, in one study of schools in Pakistan, Khan (2005) refers to World Bank reports on education in Pakistan and states that “among the observations are that government schools are so weak [emphasis added] that it would be sensible to consider subsidies for the private sector and NGO schools (World Bank 1996, p. 12 and 1997, p. 12)” (p. 82). The negative evaluation of the public education (and positive evaluation of private schools) is also observed in Pakistani government documents. For example, the recent draft education policy (National Education Policy Review Team, 2007) states that “The last few decades have witnessed a rapid expansion of the private sector in Pakistan. Some estimate it to constitute about 30% of the education sector. The prime mover for this development has been the gradual degradation of publicly funded education, particularly school education, where quality education has not been ensured and sustained for a variety of well known reasons” (p. 31). [Neoliberal/SAP oriented criticism of public schooling are found in other countries as well – e.g., see Abadzi, 2004.]

The neoliberal solution to ‘weak’ schools is to encourage the private sector to step in. Thus, it recommends that government spending be decreased on public education (Stromquist, 2002; Vavrus. 2002). This is exactly what happened in Pakistan. Table 1 below shows the education expenditure as a percentage of GDP in Pakistan.

Table 1: Expenditure on education in Pakistan
Year Education expenditure as % of GDP
1988-89 2.4
1989-90 2.2
1990-91 2.1
1991-92 2.2
1992-93 2.2
1993-94 2.2
1994-95 2.4
1995-96 2.4
1996-97 2.5
1997-98 2.3
1998-99 2.2
1999-00 2.1
2000-01 1.6
2001-02 1.9
2002-03 1.7
Source: Government of Pakistan (2004)

The table shows that the spending on education in Pakistan was already quite low in 1988 and then decreased noticeably after 2000. One of the reasons for this marked shift in 2000 is that General Musharraf led a successful coup in October 1999 that removed the democratic governments. While the democratic experience in Pakistan was not very positive, elected governments did maintain the education spending to a certain degree because they needed to get a mandate from the people who would have looked at a decrease in spending in education negatively. However, Musharraf’s government did not need to worry about elections and was therefore able to implement the SAP and reduce the state funding to education. With a decrease in state spending on education, the public schools suffered once again. People with means sent their children to private schools, and those on the lower end of the spectrum were left no choice but to send their children to free madrassas.

Rahman (2004) reports on the results of a study of inequality in education in Pakistan and its relationship to militancy and extremist opinions. In his study he focused on Urdu medium schools (public), English medium schools (private), and madrassas. A comprehensive discussion of his work is beyond the scope of this essay; however, I have drawn on the statistics that he provides in his appendices for my purposes here. Table 2 below provides an overview of the income distribution of students’ fathers in the three types of schools.



The table shows that the largest numbers of students in madrassas are from extremely poor families: 77% of the children who attend madrassas come from homes where their fathers earn less than 5000 Rs/month (approximately US$ 80). The largest number of Urdu medium students in this study also belongs to this income group. In contrast, there were no students in the private English medium schools in Rahman’s study that belonged to this income group. Conversely, the majority of the students in the English medium group belonged to upper income families; and, no students in the madrassas or the Urdu medium schools had fathers with an income of 50,000 PKR or more. In another study of madrassas, Hussain (1994), found that 49% of the students in one madrassa stated that the reason that they attended the madrassa and not a different type of school was their parents income level. The results from these two studies support the argument presented in this essay: children from poor families attend madrassas as other options are too expensive for them to afford.

A fourth piece of the puzzle that I would like to present here is the rate of increase in the number of new madrassas. Nayyar (1998) reports that in 1947, when Pakistan was created, there were a total of 245 madrassas in Pakistan. By 1987 this number had increased to 534. It was at about this time (in 1988) that the first SAPs were introduced in Pakistan (Bhatti, 1997). Since then, the increase in the number of madrassas has been drastic. According to a report published by the International Advisory Group (IAG, 2002), the number of madrassas had increased to around 10,000 by 2002. Thus, while the number of madrassas doubled in the first 40 years of Pakistan’s existence, they increased by over 1700% in the 14 years since SAPs were introduced.

The purpose of this essay is not to argue that neoliberal economic policies are solely responsible for the increase in the number of students attending madrassas. There are many other possible reasons for this as well – most importantly the Islamization policies during General Zia’s government and the exploitation of religion for political/military purposes in the war against the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s. However, the arguments presented in this essay do show that SAPs reduce state funding for education. As a result of these cuts, parents from low income groups find it hard to provide access to affordable quality education for their children. This makes free madrassas attractive to them. With a coupling of this economic incentive with people’s affiliation with their religion, it is no surprise that these parents choose to send their children to madrassas. And, in so far as this is true, the World Bank and the IMF (through SAPs) are also responsible for the rapid increase in the number madrassas in Pakistan.


References

Abadzi, Helen (2004). Education for all or just the smartest poor? Prospects 34(3), pp. 271-289.

Bhatti, Tahira (1997). Structural adjustment and the crisis of governance in Pakistan. Indian Progressive Study Group (IPSG) Annual Newsletter. New York: IPSG. Retrieved from http://www.columbia.edu/cu/ipsg/pak_sap.htm on October 20, 2007

Hussain, Fayyaz (1994). An Ethnographic Study of Jamia
Ashrafia: A Religious School at Lahore with Special Emphasis on Socio-practical Relevance of its Objective. Unpublished M.Sc. Dissertation, Department of Anthropology, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad.

International Advisory Group (2002). Pakistan: Madrassas, Extremism and the Military. Islamabad/Brussels: International Advisory Group Asia, Report No. 36.

Khan, Shahruk (2005). Basic Education in Rural Pakistan. Karachi: Oxford University Press.

National Education Policy Review Team (February, 2007).
Education in Pakistan: A White Paper. Islamabad: Ministry of Education.

Nayyar, A. H. (1998). Madrassa education: frozen in time. In Hoodbhoy, Pervez (Ed.) Education and the State: Fifty Years of Pakistan. Karachi: Oxford University Press.

Rahman, Tariq (2004). Denizens of Alien Worlds: A Study of Education, Inequality and Polarization in Pakistan. Karachi: Oxford University Press.

Stromquist, Nelly (2003). The twinning of ideas and material conditions: globalization, neoliberalism and postmodernism. In N. Stromquist Education in a Globalized World: The Connectivity of Economic Power, Technology, and Knowledge. Lanham MD: Rowman and Littlefield, pp. 19-35.

Vavrus, Frances (2002). Making distinctions: privatization and the (un)educated girl on Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. International Journal of Educational Development 22(5), pp. 527-547.

World Bank (1996). Improving Basic Education in Pakistan: Community Participation, System Accountabiliyt, and Efficiency. Washington D.C.: Population and Human Resource Development Division, South Asia Region.

World Bank (1997). Towards a Strategy for Elementary Education. Washington D.C.: Population and Human Resource Development Division, South Asia Region.