The Impact of Conflict on the Education Sector in Timor-Leste: An Analysis of Irregular Trends Observed in Educational Data

Abstract

  In 2000, at the World Education Forum in Dakar, known as one of the strongest mobilization forces formulating global education development policy, the Dakar Framework for Action was adopted. This successfully raised awareness of the growing need for education reconstruction in post-conflict countries among UN agencies, international aid agencies and academic research institutes. Since then, there has been research conducted in the field of education and conflict in developing countries, mainly by UN agencies and aid practioners that include findings from their project implementations.

  Although it is easy to imagine that conflict has a negative impact on most education sectors in general, it is rather difficult to analyze the mechanism of relations between education and conflict due to difficulty in collecting objective educational data under any conflict situation.

  However, in recent years, a comparative methodology has become increasingly popular in the field of education and conflict that captures the trend of educational situation in a country before and after conflict by matching education outcomes derived from social survey data conducted after the conflict to information of conflict areas as well as a range of subjects exposed to conflict. Those using this methodology tend to seek especially the changes in trends in educational performance indicators such as the completion rate or the schooling years when conflict occured.

  This study also aims to find the impact of conflict on education outcomes, and uses the cases of several conflicts experienced in Timor-Leste in the past. The study compares educational trends that can be drived from available existing educational data in each period of social changes under the occupation and rule of Portugal and Indonesia. In particular, the study compares the difference in education outcomes between primary and lower secondary schools in four different periods, namely, the conflict period immediately after the Indonesian occupation, the normalization period under Indonesian occupation, the further crisis period during the Timor-Leste independence referendum, and the reconstruction and development period after independence.

  More specifically, following a review of the recent and increasing amount of literature on the impact of conflict on education outcomes, this study briefly introduces the impact of the Portugese ruling policy in Timor-Leste on access to education by showing the change in the number of students and schools in this time period. The study next compares trends in the number of students and schools by year and also completion rates by birth cohort in respective primary and lower secondary educational institutions during the 10-year conflict period after the Indonesian occupation and the following 10-year normalization period in Timor-Leste. Furthermore, the impact of conflict on education quality is examined by comparing changes in the number of schools, teachers and students before and after the independence referendum held in 1999. Finally, the study analyzes how the various previous social and security situations have impacted the recent education outcomes in Timor-Leste after its independence.

  This study found, first, that the conflict occurring during the initial Indonesian occupation period from the mid-1970s and early 1980s had a negative impact on educational outcomes, particularly in lower secondary education. In addition, it was found that the impact of conflict affected not only the official age cohort in primary and lower secondary education at the time of conflict, but also the age cohort younger than the official school age group at the time of conflict who would be exposed to the impact of conflict in education after the conflict ended. The study also found a sudden decline in the quality of primary education occurring (View PDF for the rest of the abstract.)