The political, economic and societal challenges encountered by public school systems in developing countries

Education systems in low income countries are routinely portrayed as experiencing a learning crisis and as facing strong political economy challenges that impede efforts aimed at improving quality. This paper aims to improve the understanding of the confluence of political, bureaucratic and societal challenges faced by public school actors in their quest to reform and compete in the context of Nepal. It draws on extensive in-depth qualitative and quantitative data on the perceptions of public sector actors, including national and district officials and school principals. I show that stakeholders from the national to school level confirm that the combination of political economy challenges and the unintended consequences of stigmatization of the public sector due to private growth have negatively affected motivations to reform. The regression analyses indicate that the barriers to reform are especially heightened in public schools that face higher levels of private competition, and schools that are less selective. The in-depth analysis reveal how some principals and some districts have been able to thrive despite these conditions, providing some optimistic narratives, if not solutions on the way forward.