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Politics, Markets, and the Organization of Schools

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

John E. Chubb  and
Terry M. Moe
John E. Chubb
Affiliation:
The Brookings Institution
Terry M. Moe
Affiliation:
Stanford University
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Abstract

We offer a comparative analysis of public and private schools, presenting data from a new national study—the Administrator and Teacher Survey—that expands on the pathbreaking High School and Beyond survey. We find that public and private schools are distinctively different in environment and organization. Most importantly, private schools are more likely to possess the characteristics widely believed to produce effectiveness. We argue throughout that the differences across the sectors are anchored in the logic of politics and markets. This argument derives from our belief that environmental context has pervasive consequences for the organization and operation of all schools and specifically that the key differences between public and private environments—and thus between public and private schools—derive from their characteristic methods of social control: the public schools are subordinates in a hierarchic system of democratic politics, whereas private schools are largely autonomous actors “controlled” by the market.

Type
Articles
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 82 , Issue 4 , December 1988 , pp. 1065 - 1087
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1988

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