Rethinking the Welfare State: The prospects for ... - e-Library

Rethinking the selfare state 158
beneficiaries). 136 The great danger in this direction is that the politically vocal will
succeed in expanding a targeted program and scarce education resources will be
transferred to wealthy families who previously paid for private education themselves. 137
The best way to prevent such an outcome appears to be the development of strong
school-based governance institutions. 138 Reforms might include: mandatory school
councils with clear mandates and a cross-section of stakeholders; increasing the
responsiveness of regional boards of education; increasing public education on the role
and importance of board trustees and school councils; and alter the character of
government oversight from a model of “running” school boards to one where government
“sets measurable performance obligations and monitors performance.” 139 Responsive and
efficient school governance might also achieve a more balanced relationship between
“voice” and “exit.”
Notwithstanding the arguments to the contrary, a universal voucher system is probably
preferable to a program with a targeted ambit. If benefits through improvements in
student outcomes attend the introduction of choice to a targeted segment of the schoolage
population, then it is likely that proportionally more benefits will attend the
introduction of choice to the entire school-age population. Arthur Hauptman makes
precisely this point in the context of higher education, and the analysis equally applies
here. “Vouchers that benefit a high percentage of students [and/or] pay a high proportion
of the bill are more likely to have an impact on both student and institutional behaviour
than programs with a lesser degree of coverage.” 140
Qualified suppliers
One of the critical threshold issues confronting governments in establishing voucher
programs, particularly in light of the role for education in promoting citizenship values, is
the question of whether sectarian institutions should be eligible for funding. In the United
States, this debate has been remitted to the courts in interpreting the scope of the First
Amendment’s Establishment Clause, which forbids the direct public funding of religious
institutions. 141 Since the first voucher programs emerged, there have been several
challenges to these programs on Establishment Clause grounds. The Supreme Court, in
Lemon v.Kurtzman, 142 stated that in order for a statute challenged on these grounds to be
deemed constitutional, it must satisfy three criteria. “First, the statute must have a secular
legislative purpose; second, its principal or primary effect must be one that neither
advances nor inhibits religion…[and] finally, the statute must not foster ‘an excessive
government entanglement with religion’.” 143 Several decisions by the Supreme Court
have tended to uphold publicly funded voucher initiatives. For example, the Mitchell
v.Helms 144 decision firmly established that “when funding is routed to parents and they,
in turn, choose religious schools independently of the state, the use of the funds by the
schools is irrelevant to the Establishment Clause.” 145 This indicates that unless state
funding is being directly supplied to religious schools, the Establishment Clause has not
been violated. The most recent case involving these issues was Zelman v.Simmons-
Harris, 146 in which the Supreme Court ruled that the Ohio Pilot Voucher Program did not
violate the Establishment Clause. Therefore, although the Establishment Clause has