Research initiatives
EQUIPPPS is a network of academics, policy makers, development practitioners and other stakeholders researching the role of Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) in development. The overall aim of the network is to build inter-sectoral and inter-disciplinary collaboration on PPPs that will identify and foster future research. Part of this is the development of a new policy and analytical frame to understand PPPs across sectors, countries and regions.
The Privatisation in Education Research Initiative is a global research and networking initiative seeking to animate an accessible and informed public debate on alternative education provision. In particular, it examines the social justice implications of changes in the coordination, financing and governance of education.
The National Center for the Study of Privatization in Education was founded by Henry M. Levin in 2000 as a hub for nonpartisan information and analysis. At the time, privatization of education was on the rise and at the heart of policy debate. Privatization came in the form of vouchers, tuition tax credits, charter schools, and for-profit management of both charter schools and conventional district schools. To provide solid grounding for policy debate, NCSPE began conducting research, holding conferences, and posting working papers.
The Think Twice Think Tank Review Project (National Education Policy Center) produces expert third party reviews of of selected think tank publications. Using academic peer review standards, reviewers consider the quality and defensibility of a report's assumptions, methods, findings, and recommendations. Written in non-academic language, reviews are intended to help policy makers, reporters, and others assess the social science merit of a reviewed report and to judge its value in guiding policy.
Measuring Markets: the case of the Education Reform Act 1988  research project studied the changing  social composition of school intakes in England & Wales since 1988 and their relationship with admissions procedures, 'local' markets and examination performances. This research builds upon previous studies by Dr.Stephen Gorard and Dr. John Fitz. The basis for this project is data provided by the Department for Education & Employment and the Welsh Assembly on the number of students eligible for, and taking up, free school meals in every secondary school. The analysis of this empirical data is supported by interviews with LEA admissions officers and interviews with senior school staff.  
Civil society initiatives focusing on education privatization
Unite for Quality Education is a campaign of Education International (EI), the largest world federation of teachers' unions, that demands that quality education for all remains at the top of the agenda for a sustainable, peaceful and prosperous future. Within the framework of this broader campaign, Education International has articulated a global response to the commercialisation and marketisation of education. 
The Latin American Campaign for the Right to Education aims to contribute to the realization of the right to education by considering each and every dimension of this right (i.e. availability, accessibility, acceptability and adaptability), and by promoting civil society organizations' influence in education policies. As one of the regional members of the Global Campaign for Education, CLADE has focused on education privatization tendencies in the last years.  
The Right to Education Project (RTE) was established in 2000 by the first UN Special Rapporteur on the right to education, Katarina Tomaševski, and re-launched in 2008 as a collaborative initiative, supported by ActionAid International, Amnesty International, Global Campaign for Education, Save the Children and Human Rights Watch. The RTE is paying attention to the education privatisation phenomenon from a human rights perspective.
The Network for Public Education Toolkit: School Privatization Explained was created to alert the general public regarding the various forms that privatization takes and the consequences associated with each. It presents the evidence of what we already know about charters, vouchers, education tax credits, and so called “savings accounts.” It is organized around key questions, providing answers in clear language to the questions we at the Network for Public Education are most often asked. 
Recent special issues
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         Non-State Actors in Education in the Global South
Oxford Review of Education, vol. 42, issue 5, 2016
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                Privatizaçao e Militarizaçao: Ameaças Renovadas à Gestao Democrática da Escola Pública 
Educaçao & Sociedade, vol. 27, issue 134, 2017


Lo público y lo privado en los sistemas educativos: diferencias, tensiones y equilibrios
​Revista Colombiana de la Educación, núm. 70, 2016

Privatización educativa y globalización
Revista de la Asociación de Sociología de la Educación,
vol. 9, issue 2, 2016
Recent books
Ndimande, B. S., & Lubienski, C. (Eds.). (2017). Privatization and the Education of Marginalized Children: Policies, Impacts and Global Lessons. Routledge.

The book examines the issue of markets in education as they shape educational opportunities for disadvantaged children―for better or worse―in countries around the globe. With chapters written by leading scholars in the field of international education, this book analyzes the important questions of equity and markets, privatization and opportunity, and policies' objectives and outcomes, and it explores the potential, promises, and empirical evidence on the role of market mechanisms. Offering insights from theoretical as well as international-comparative perspectives, this volume will appeal to researchers and students of education-focused public policy, sociology, and international economics. A timely contribution to the field, Privatization and the Education of Marginalized Children aims to engage in public/private debate by addressing the larger societal exclusions and segregation of communities in which these schools exist.
Abrams, S. E. (2016). Education and the commercial mindset. Harvard University Press.

America’s commitment to public schooling once seemed unshakable. But today the movement to privatize K–12 education is stronger than ever. A veteran teacher and administrator, Samuel Abrams examines the rise of market forces in public education and reveals how a commercial mindset has taken over. Abrams argues that while the commercial mindset sidesteps fundamental challenges, public schools should adopt lessons from the business world. Citing foreign practices, he recommends raising teacher salaries to attract and retain talent, conferring more autonomy on educators to build ownership, and employing sampling techniques rather than universal assessments to gauge student progress.
Adamson, F., Astrand, B., & Darling-Hammond, L. (Eds.). (2016). Global education reform: How privatization and public investment influence education outcomes. Routledge.

With contributions from Linda Darling-Hammond, Michael Fullan, Pasi Sahlberg, and Martin Carnoy, Global Education Reform is an eye-opening analysis of national educational reforms and the types of high-achieving systems needed to serve all students equitably.The collection documents the ideologically and educationally distinctive approaches countries around the world have taken to structuring their education systems. Focusing on three pairs of case studies written by internationally acclaimed experts, the book provides a powerful analysis of the different ends of an ideological spectrum----from strong state investments in public education to market-based approaches.
Hursh, D. W. (2015). The end of public schools: The corporate reform agenda to privatize education. Routledge.

The End of Public Schools analyzes the effect of foundations, corporations, and non-governmental organizations on the rise of neoliberal principles in public education. By first contextualizing the privatization of education within the context of a larger educational crisis, and with particular emphasis on the Gates Foundation and influential state and national politicians, it describes how specific policies that limit public control are advanced across all levels. Informed by a thorough understanding of issues such as standardized testing, teacher tenure, and charter schools, David Hursh provides a political and pedagogical critique of the current school reform movement, as well details about the increasing resistance efforts on the part of parents, teachers, and the general public.
Macpherson, I., Robertson, S., & Walford, G. (Eds.). (2014). Education, Privatisation and Social Justice: Case Studies from Africa, South Asia and South East Asia. Symposium Books Ltd.

The involvement of private actors in education is not new yet in the last decade critical issues have arisen that demand close scrutiny. This volume explores emerging forms of the private through case studies from Africa, South Asia and South East Asia and makes three related observations.
First, what is new about these manifestations is their scale, scope and penetration into almost all aspects of the education endeavour – from the administrative apparatus to policymaking, and from formal provision in education settings to out-of-school activities, such as private tutoring. Second, what is particularly controversial about these developments is how education itself is being recast; as a sector it is increasingly being opened up to profit-making and trade, and to agenda-setting by private, commercial interests. Third, the learner is increasingly conceptualised as a consumer, and education a consumer good. 
Felouzis, G., Maroy, C., & Van Zanten, A. (2013). Les marchés scolaires: sociologie d'une politique publique d'éducation. PUF

What is meant by "school markets"? How do they operate on a day-to-day basis and what is the impact of this policy on the effectiveness and equity of the school? The three authors, educational sociologists, use the results of international research to answer these questions. Exploring a triple form of school markets ("private" markets, quasi-markets and more informal markets), they study these markets in action by highlighting the importance of local contexts and interactions over time. They also analyze the reasons and consequences of the choices of parents and the interdependencies between schools, as well as the main modes of regulating their actions. In the central question, "do school markets produce more freedom and allow more pedagogical innovations or create more segregation?. The authors reply in a nuanced way, showing that the effects of this mode of coordination of educational action vary according to national frameworks and local arrangements.
Robertson, S., Mundy, K., & Verger, A. (Eds.). (2012). Public private partnerships in education: New actors and modes of governance in a globalizing world. Edward Elgar Publishing.

This insightful book brings together both academics and researchers from a variety of international organizations and aid agencies to explore the complexities of public private partnerships (PPPs) as a resurgent, hybrid mode of educational governance that operates across scales, from the community to the global. The contributors expertly study the different types of partnership arrangements and thoroughly critique the value of PPPs. Some chapters explore how PPPs, as a policy idea, have been constructed in transnational agendas for educational development and circulated globally, whilst other chapters explore the role and implications of PPPs in developing countries, providing arguments for and against an expanding reliance on PPPs in national educational systems. The theoretical framing of the book draws upon leading theories of international relations to develop a unique perspective on the global governance of education. It will prove insightful for both scholars and policymakers in public policy and education.
Ball, S. J. (2012). Global education inc: New policy networks and the neo-liberal imaginary. Routledge.

Using the approach of ‘policy sociology’ and the methods of social network analysis, Global Education Inc. explores the policy activities of edu-businesses, neo-liberal advocacy networks and policy entrepreneurs, and of social enterprises and ‘new’ philanthropy. It also addresses the ways in which education and education policy itself are now being exported and bought and sold as profitable commodities and how entrenched problems of educational development and educational quality and access are now being addressed through ‘market solutions’. That is, by the involvement of private providers in the delivery of educational services, both independently and on behalf of the state.