Lessons in State Capacity from Delhi's Schools

Yamini Aiyar, Former President and Chief Executive, Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi

Yamini Aiyar is a public policy scholar and former President and Chief Executive, Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi. She is currently a Visiting Senior Fellow at Brown University, USA. Her research interests span the fields of public finance, social policy, state capacity, federalism, governance, and the study of contemporary politics in India. Throughout her career, Aiyar has worked in leadership roles to nurture institutional spaces that innovate using social science methods to produce empirically grounded, policy-relevant research on the Indian state and contemporary policy challenges. She has published widely in academic publications and the popular press, and writes regularly on current affairs and policy in mainstream Indian newspapers.

1. IntroductionPart I: Listening to the Frontline2. On State Capacity and the Reforms Puzzle3. Talking Like the State4. The Making and Shaping of the Government Schoolteacher5. Reframing the Debate on Frontline Worker MotivationPart II: Rewriting the Grammar of the Education System: Describing Delhi's Education Revolution6. Education Policy in India: A Tale of Contested Ideas and Creative Resistance7. Delhi's Education Revolution: Unpacking the Key Components8. From Hierarchy and Legalism to Deliberation9. Inside the Classroom: Creative Disruption or Creative Resistance?Part III Building State Capacity: A Voyage of Discovery10. Reframing the State Capacity Debate