Democracies believe that the cultivation of a culture of civic participation is vital for political
institutions to survive and for the sustainability of democracy itself, and that community
involvement in education is an effective model to foster this type of culture with. Accordingly,
this thesis will examine the role of civic participation in education in building the capacities of
rural communities and advancing behaviors of democracy through the formation of a culture of
social capital among them. Social capital is created and fostered by capitalizing on the human
aspect of the community, bonding behaviors of its members with one another, and bridging the
community’s newly-developed organizational and associational skills with other supporting
external actors and with the policy making level1
. Meanwhile, the basic premise of most
theories2
of modern education emphasizes the primary role of culture in knowledge construction,
and that education is affected by and integrated within the surrounding context. This knowledge,
shaped by children through active interactions with their teachers, parents, school principals, and
community conditions, helps form their views of the world, and produces active and responsible
citizens nurtured through modes of education that pay respect to their surrounding socio-cultural
and economic conditions. In parallel, communities exhibit and sustain democratic behaviors by
engaging in and ensuring the success of the educational process itself, which ultimately leads to
their empowerment.
As in the case with this thesis, the formation of social capital could be challenged by constraints
that are both existent on the micro-community level, such as poverty conditions, impeding
customs and traditions, such as resistance towards the education of girls for example, and other
constraints that are posed by the wider policy level. Furthermore, leveraging efforts that aim at changing the human behavior and making investments on the human capital is complicated and
does not make the process self-evident, for community interactions may not respond well or may
continue to exhibit internal barriers to the creation of such culture. In addition, community
participation may advance social capital on the local community level, but its scope may not
impact the wider policy making arena. Similarly, and especially under authoritarian regimes,
education may in fact lead to a decrease in the creation of a culture of civic and political
participation. Accordingly, a prerequisite investigation of the level of “readiness” to the creation
of social capital in a given community is central to the analysis. Furthermore, poorer
communities, such as in the case with the sample village of this thesis, tend to already exhibit
signs of social capital; the kind of capital that helps them “get by”; by their very own nature of
being poor. Whether the existence of “some” level of social capital, even if a limited one, is a pre
requisite to the advancement of social capital among these communities, and whether it is also a
pre requisite to the success of a development project, or not, is going to be researched in this
study. Needless to say, I define limited social capital in this context as either limited in its
resources, limited in its impact, or both.
Hence, the research question of this study is as follows: To what extent does community
engagement and civic participation in education advance social capital and develop democratic
behaviors among local communities in Egypt? From this main question, other questions that I
have addressed in my field work on donor-funded community based projects to basic education
in Egypt follow; how did participating in an educational project impact the community? What is
the extent to which community behaviors have changed as a result of this participation? Does
community participation ensure the sustainability of the project? What types of democratic
practices were introduced early on in the project, and have remained sustainable past the duration
of the program, if any? How do community members view the role of the state in education?
How does community participation enhance the educational conditions in local communities? I
am hypothesizing that community-driven education programs are successful in helping to
advance social capital among local communities, and that this success eventually leads to the
creation of democracy among them. This hypothesis is based on the profound relationship
between social capital and democracy. This relationship is evident in theoretical literature, such
6
as Robert D. Putnam’s work3
, that links the strengthening of social networks among
communities and one another with the advancement of social capital, and that this advancement
leads to a culture of participation, which eventually leads to democracy.
Accordingly, this thesis will tackle important key words included between education, social
capital, and democracy, and their relationships between communities and community
participation, governments, rural development, gender roles, gender disparities in the society and
in education, development aid, as well as other key areas. The research question will be
answered and the hypothesis will be tested by conducting a research that examines the role of the
New Schools Program (NSP), a comprehensive School Based Reform (SBR) project, in
advancing social capital and evolving behaviors of democracy on the local level through the
engagement of the community in this educational project. USAID, with the help of CARE being
the main implementing agency, has sponsored NSP from the year 2000 to 20008 at the
governorates of Minya, Bny Suwwāf, and Sūhaj in Upper Egypt. The program is commended for
exhibiting exemplary signs of involving communities and parents in the educational process by
providing education in areas where children lacked access to education, and where girls in
specific have not been attending school, and by offering long term direct training of teachers
with strong follow up. Most importantly, the program is primarily commended for changing
local perceptions towards the importance of the education of girls. The program also created
decentralization through school finances by collecting community contributions of land,
material, and financial donations, providing teachers’ trainings, creating boards of trustees
(BOTs) and Parents’ Associations (PAs) with women representation within them, and exceeding
its first targets for students’ enrollment, where it reached a cumulative enrollment figure of
44,197; a 2.87% overachievement over its performance target. The Community mobilization
component in NSP was very strong, and the involvement of the community from the beginning
created a strong sense of belonging and achievement among community members and one
another. My study will focus on the local village of Al Berka, which falls under the Mallawi
Center of the Minya governorate, and where the NSP project has established 3 out of the 4
schools in the village that are still functional and sustainable till date.