CONDITIONAL CASH
TRANSFERS AND EDUCATION:
UNITED IN THEORY, DIVORCED
IN POLICY
Michelle Morais de Sa e Silva
PhD, Columbia University
Background
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CCT’s: expected to reduce poverty while building
human capital through educational and healthrelated conditionalities .
International literature: pressure for CCT impact on
ed quality indicators
This study’s assumption: minimum coordination
between CCTs and education at the policymaking
level.
Research Questions
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RQ1 - What factors contribute to CCTs being
adopted (or not) by education policymakers?
RQ2 - What factors prevent or enable CCTs to
induce new policies for improved education
quality?
RQ3 - How have conditional cash transfers
been politically sustained?
Theoretical Framework
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Four bodies of theory/literature that address policy
continuity and change
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Advocacy coalition framework
Policy borrowing and lending
Punctuated equilibrium theory
Civic capacity
Theoretical constructs and concepts guided data
collection and analysis
Methodology
Case selection:
1. Appraisal of all existing CCTs
2. Selection of three cases, each with a different
structure of educational conditionalities:
 Opportunity NYC: attendance and test
performance
 Subsidios (Bogota): attendance and completion
 Bolsa Familia (Brazil): enrolment and attendance
Methodology
Data sources:
 66 semi-structured interviews
 Policy documents
 National and international newspaper articles
 Webpages of the World Bank and the InterAmerican Development Bank
Findings – Opportunity NYC
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RQ1: Opportunity NYC has no buy-in within the
DoE. It is seen as an experiment.
RQ2: Opportunity NYC is divorced from current
debates on how to improve education quality.
RQ3: There is no mobilized opposition to the
program.
Findings - Subsidios
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RQ1: Program implemented by the DoE. Availability
of international funding and the influence of
consultants were important factors
RQ2: No change in education policies. Subsidios is
seen as a program that enhances student wellbeing.
RQ3: Supported by teachers, principals, and
parents. Support from other groups along party
lines.
Findings – Bolsa Familia
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RQ1: Bolsa Familia is not an ed policy
RQ2: Inadequate ed quality in public schools is
recognized as a problem, but BF has not created
additional pressure to solve that
RQ3: The continuity of BF is unquestionable.
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Civic capacity created by beneficiary families
Flexibility to adjust to various political discourses
Conclusions
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The assumption that there was coordination
between CCTs and ed policies did not hold
CCTs have not been adopted or owned by
education policymakers. They have not led to
new policies for improved quality of education:
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United in theory (in the international literature on
CCTs)
Divorced in policy
Political sustainability due to their “popularity”
and the possibility of making CCTs adjust to
various political orientations