Evaluation of the Education Sector Enhancement Program in Barbados

ABSTRACT

Drawing on the education production function literature, we examine the short-run impact of comprehensive education reforms in Barbados on primary school student outcomes. Using a variety of specifications to test the robustness of our results, we find modest and mixed changes in student test scores. Our findings are discussed in the context of management challenges that resulted from the need to coordinate a multi-faceted project in a rapidly developing nation; alignment of goals and schedules of two multi-national development banks, the Ministry of Education, Youth Affairs and Sports (MES), and the Government of Barbados; and, a very rapidly changing information technology environment that led, in part, to changes in planned capital improvements in schools, equipment needs, and had implications for teacher training.     

Asian workers in the Gulf states of the Middle East

One of the most conspicuous developments in recent years in the Korean political economy is the enormous increase of Korean investment in Southeast Asia, especially Indonesia. In particular, since the appreciation of the Korean currency (won) in 1987 and the rapid increase of industrial action by Korean workers, more Korean foreign direct investment (FDI) has been carried out by small-and medium-sized firms, particularly in the manufacturing sector. However, many of the Korean firms in the region have already experienced various problems. This article examines the determinants of the new phase of Korean FDI. It also discusses the possible consequences of Korean FDI in Indonesia.     

South Asia and the Asiatic Mode of production: Some conceptual and empirical problems

Abstract

The resurgence of dialectical sociology has stimulated a renewed interest in the investigation of political and economic developments in third world countries with the aid of Marxist paradigms. In this connection a substantial volume of literature has been produced recently, mostly by western scholars, on Marx's definition of the Asiatic Mode of Production (AMP) or its related genre, such as Oriental Despotism. Hopefully the revival of this interest will open up lines of investigation hitherto ignored or inadequately developed. At the same time numerous difficulties arise on the theoretical, empirical and ideological levels when one attempts to explain the dynamics of change in countries and regions of South Asia with the above mentioned concepts in mind.     

The green revolution in South India and North Vietnam

Abstract

In late 1976 I spent ten months in Thanjavur District of southeast India, re-studying two villages after an absence of twenty-five years. I had gone back to find out what had happened to the village people, especially with respect to their standard of living, their relations of production and their integration into the world economy. I was particularly interested in the effects of land reforms passed between 1952 and 1974, and of the introduction of “green revolution” technology since 1965.