Parallel Report submitted by the National Campaign for Education-Nepal, the Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the Sciences Po law school Clinic, and partners, on the occasion of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of Nepal during the 23rd session of the UPR Working Group.
This report shows that the current organisation of education system in Nepal, in particular a high level of unregulated private involvement in education, is creating and entrenching segregation in education. Such segregation in itself constitutes a human rights violation and need to be ended. It is also the source of additional other human rights abuses, including discrimination on the grounds of socio-economic background, gender and race, the limitation of the right to free quality education, and the lowering of education quality. This situation is extremely problematic due to the immediate human rights violations it is causing, but also because the injustices it generates contribute to threatening the fragile social cohesion and peace that exist in Nepal.
This guide has been developed to provide practical advice on conducting research in order to support human rights advocacy on privatisation in education, using regional and international mechanisms (focusing on UN treaty bodies). It draws on the experiences of the Right to Education Initiative and the Global Initiative on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in engaging in similar work in various countries over the last few years.
On 12 June 2014, during the June Session of the Human Rights Council, the Portuguese Mission, together with Privatisation in Education Research Initiative (PERI) and the Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (GI-ESCR), convened a side-event on privatisation and its impact on the right to education at Palais des Nations in Geneva. In its presentation, Antoni Verger (senior researcher and lecturer at the Department of Sociology of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona) gives an overview of the global trends, multiple manifestations and common concerns.
On 12 June 2014, during the June Session of the Human Rights Council, the Portuguese Mission, together with Privatisation in Education Research Initiative (PERI) and the Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (GI-ESCR), convened a side-event on privatisation and its impact on the right to education at Palais des Nations in Geneva. In this podcast, Iracema Nascimento dos Santos, from the Brazilian Campaign for the Right to Education shares the Brazilian case.
This factsheet on 10 Human Rights Standards for Education Privatisation is intended to serve as a tool for education and human rights advocates on the topic of the privatisation of education and the right to education. It provides basic information on the right to education as it relates to education privatisation, focusing on the most central international human rights legal standards that relate to privatisation. The factsheet may be used to raise awareness among government officials, policy-makers, donors, teachers, private education providers, and other education stakeholders. It will also aid civil society organisations in understanding education privatisation as a human rights issue and in developing a rights-based position.
The Right to Education Initiative, with the support of international and British organisations as well as teachers' unions have submitted a report to the Committee on the Rights of the Child about the UK's support of the growth of private actors in education through its development aid: questioning its responsibilities as regards its human rights extra-territorial obligations.
The report raises concern about the increased use of British aid money to support for-profit schools, in particular so-called ‘low-fee’ private schools, which are fuelling inequality, creating segregation and undermining the right to education.
The report finds that the UK’s policies in support of private education through its development aid are problematic and that the country could be violating its extra-territorial obligations under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in two regards:
- Firstly, the UK’s support for for-profit, fee-charging private schools that do not reach the poorest is questioned in light of the UK’s obligations to fulfil the right to education, including the right to free quality education without discrimination;
- Secondly, the UK’s responsibility is questioned in particular in relation to its own impact assessments that have been conducted on its policies of providing support to private schools and which have concluded that projects supporting private education providers are less likely to target the most marginalised, and that more research needs to be carried out on the impact of private schools in developing countries on, among other elements, the efficiency of “low-fee” private schools.
This report provides an analysis of support to private sector engagement in Global Partnership for Education (GPE) recipient countries, building off a prior study focusing on GPE decision-making on private schooling. This review includes an analysis of 101 documents relating to the 40 GPE recipient partner countries with active Education Sector Program Implementation Grants (ESPIGs). Country profiles of Haiti, Pakistan, and Uganda are provided in an Appendix, each of which highlights important trends with implications for GPE support to private participation in education.
The report contextualizes private engagement in education from a human rights perspective. Based on a descriptive analysis of Education Sector Plans (ESPs) and ESPIG project documents, it finds that GPE projects include far less private sector engagement in education than do country-designed ESPs. The report also gives a brief account of GRA grants and the single GRA project that engages the private sector.
Summary reflections on private sector engagement in GPE recipient countries note trends and areas for further investigation including issues concerning the ambiguous descriptions of private schools within the documents; the range of rationales provided for support to private schools; tax/fiscal incentives for private engagement; PPPs in early childhood education; private participation in policy-making; the role of the private sector as an education funder; and the widely agreed-upon need for regulation of private schools.
The analysis concludes that while a notable presence and expansion of private participation in GPE recipient countries is clear, this engagement cannot be attributed directly to GPE. In fact, the discrepancy between private school support in ESPs and ESPIGs reflects a GPE prioritization of public education. Yet some significant tensions emerge between GPE’s commitment to the right to education and particular forms of private participation as identified in the project documents and ESPs.
The Global Partnership for Education treads a fine line relating to private engagement in education, navigating its dual mandate to both support education as a human right and a public good, while simultaneously promoting country ownership and nationally identified priorities. And so while GPE is in a position to maintain its course in predominantly supporting public education, this current stance may come in tension with the goals of recipient governments and other stakeholders within countries.
Du 23 au 26 octobre s’est tenue la deuxième Rencontre francophone sur la marchandisation et la privatisation de l’éducation à l’Institut de la Francophonie pour l’Éducation et la Formation à Dakar. Cet événement a réuni 107 délégués issus de 25 pays. Le rapport fournit un état des lieux de la privatisation et de la marchandisation dans l’espace francophone, sur la base des discussions qui ont eu lieu lors de la rencontre, ainsi qu’un résumé de la consultation francophone sur les principes directeurs des droits de l’Homme relatifs aux obligations des Etats concernant les acteurs privés dans l’éducation.
The publication highlights the low funding of public education which is leading to its decline and consequent growth in privatisation of education. The study also focuses on the private schools’ failure to follow the norms and regulations set out by the Nepali Constitution, as well as the government’s failure to ensure the implementation of these requirements. It also warns that private schools are leading to greater segregation and gaps within the society, between rich and poor, and boys and girls.
This paper highlights key concluding observations adopted between September 2014 and November 2017 by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC), the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR), the UN Committee on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights (ACHPR) regarding the role of private actors in education in Ghana, Chile, Morocco, Uganda, Kenya, Philippines and Brazil. These add to more than 50 other concluding observations previously issued by these committees on the topic.