Medersas and Girls’ Education in West and West Central Africa: The Gender Consequences of Non-State, Faith-Based Service Provision Michele Angrist Department of Political Science Union College *October 2017* DRAFT: PLEASE DO NOT CITE OR QUOTE 1 Introduction In Muslim-majority West and West Central Africa over the past several decades, private faith-based primary schools called medersas increasingly have provided communities with an alternative to state-run public schools. Medersas offer students instruction about Islam and in the Arabic language together with modern subjects such as science, math, and social studies. In this they differ from public schools, which tend to be secular and offer instruction largely in English or French. Against the backdrop of the political science literature on the provision of social services by non-state actors, for ten Muslim-majority countries in West and West Central Africa, this study documents the reach of the medersa phenomenon at the primary level and assesses the impact of medersas on girls’ access to basic education. The study is important because, when it comes to girls’ education, the stakes do not get higher than in this region. According to World Bank figures, globally, female adult literacy figures are lowest in Sub-Saharan Africa1. If one ranks female literacy rates in African states from high to low, of 54 states, West and West Central African countries cluster at the bottom. Specifically, the fourteen continental member states of the West African regional body ECOWAS, together with Chad and the Central African Republic, constitute 16 of the 20 lowest female adult literacy rates on the continent. In other words, West and West Central Africa constitute the region of the world with the absolute poorest record in terms of educating girls. The gendered consequences of non-state provision of education – whether positive, negative, or mixed – will be especially impactful in these countries. West and West Central Africa encompass the vast majority of Muslim-majority, Sub- Saharan African states. States in this region that do not possess a majority Muslim population, tend possess regionally concentrated, significant Muslim minorities, such as those found in 2 northern Ghana, northern Côte D’Ivoire, and northern Cameroon. As such, nearly all play host to medersas, a private Islamic schooling trend that has become increasingly prominent in the region since the 1980s. This article examines medersas in comparative perspective, specifically focusing on the 10 majority Muslim countries in continental West and West Central Africa: Mauritania, Niger, Senegal, the Gambia, Mali, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Burkina Faso, Chad, and Nigeria.2 A considerable interdisciplinary literature on medersas in this region is accessible in English and French. Yet the bulk of this literature are studies of single country cases – or even specific regions with a single country. No systematic, comprehensive analysis of the extent of primary level medersa schooling – let alone its impact on girls’ access to basic education – exists. This study thus makes two types of contributions to the literature. The empirical contribution lies in its distillation from this vast literature of cross-national comparative data over time on the number of primary-level medersas that exist in each country, how many students they enroll, the share of primary enrollments that medersas represent nationally, and, the share of medersa enrollments that girls represent. Without the effort to collect the disparate data points in one data set, it is impossible to assess the extent of the medersa phenomenon or its import for girls. The data presented here demonstrate that medersas represent a significant portion of primary-level schooling in these countries. A conservative estimate is that medersas educate between 5 and 20% of the primary school population depending on the case. Moreover, the number of medersas and the percentage of primary schoolers educated in medersas have grown noticeably over time. The study’s analytical contribution lies in its assessment, based on this data and the broader literature on girls’ education in the region, of what the medersa phenomenon means for 3 girls’ access to basic education. The data show that medersas across the region attract significant female enrollment. Girls represent nearly 50% of enrollments in most settings; moreover, there is evidence that medersas in some settings in fact enroll more girls than boys. Conservatively, more than half a million girls attend medersas in the region. The study argues that the medersa option is attractive to particular demographics within national populations: conservative rural families, families linked to trading and commercial enterprises, and Salafi Muslim communities. Given long standing resistance among Muslim communities in West and West Central Africa to government schools – resistance that is fueled by curricular and cultural concerns and that can be especially pronounced for girls – the following further speculates that, for many girls, the medersa option may represent the difference between acquiring basic education, and no education at all. Concerns about the quality of medersa education and the degree to which medersa-schooled females persist into secondary-level study notwithstanding, primary-level medersas on balance make an important contribution to girls’ education in West and West Central Africa. Politics of Non-State Welfare Provision in Global South In past years political scientists have produced a growing literature on non-state welfare provision in the global south.3 The literature has tackled a number of key issues. Primary among these have been the consequences of increased non-state provision of social services for states’ welfare provision capacities, for the quantity and quality of services provided, for access to services (and resulting impacts on inequalities of various kinds), and for citizen-state dynamics.4 This study enters this literature in its analysis of the gender impact of the extensive provision of faith-based primary education in Muslim majority West and West Central Africa. The literature on non-state education provision has concerned itself with a number of questions. 4 There has been significant international pressure, in the form of the Millennium Development Goals and Education for All targets, for states in the global south to improve access to education, especially basic education. While some states and donor organizations have pursued cooperation with non-state providers (NSPs) in the education field to meet these targets5, others advocate improving public school systems instead due to perceived liabilities of non-state provision. Among these is concern about school quality, as well as the potential impact of private school fee structures on gender equity in access.6 For the NSP literature focused on education, Rose has lamented the dearth of scholarship probing what non-state provision means for the ability of poor, marginalized, “hard-to-reach” children to access education and for educational outcomes. Rose notes also that the role of faith- based organizations in providing education has been under-researched (2009, 128, 133). Jennings notes that faith-based service provision has deep historical roots in Africa; in his words, “it is the state that is the latecomer, not the minaret or the steeple” (2014, 133). Indeed, Muslim holy men have been providing Islamic education in Qur’anic schools in Africa for more than a millennium, and Christian missionaries began entering the schooling arena in the nineteenth century. Jennings asserts that the NSP literature has often bracketed the faith aspect when assessing service provision, and cautions that the religious element can be central to outcomes (120). It can connect NSPs powerfully globally to networks of faith, as well as locally within communities (120). Moreover, the values espoused by faith-based organizations (FBOs) can clash with developmental values such as gender equity, minority inclusion, and free speech (136). The following seeks to contribute to the literature on NSP service provision in the domain of primary education and from the perspective of concerns about gender equity of access. In so doing this study responds to calls for additional research on “what kinds of inequalities are 5 established or strengthened by the non-state provision of social welfare” (Cammett & MacLean 2014, 273). It also responds to Rose’s call for more work on the consequences of faith-based forms of non-state education provision specifically for marginalized populations. As established above, West and West Central Africa are an especially appropriate theater for such scholarship given that girls in this region access education less easily than anywhere else on the globe. The narrative also heeds Jennings’ advice to keep the religious aspect front and center in the analysis, and considers the question of whether the provision of medersa education undermines developmental values. To date, gender assessments do not figure prominently in the NSP literature. This arena is central, however, because historically state institutions have played key roles in breaking down patriarchal social structures and practices through progressive legislation and the supply of judicial, educational, and welfare institutions that buttress the goal of gender equity. If states face significant competition from private providers in the field of education, the consequences for girls and women might be particularly