Policy borrowing in madrasah education: The Singapore experience

Abstract

This chapter critically discusses reform in madrasah education using Singapore as an illustrative case study. It begins by providing an overview of madrasah education in Singapore, followed by an introduction of D. Phillips and K. Ochs's framework on policy borrowing. The chapter then applies Phillips and Ochs's framework to the development of madrasah education in Singapore. It illustrates this through a case study of curriculum reform in a madrasah in Singapore. The chapter highlights a key challenge faced by madrasahs in Singapore in their attempts to reform madrasah education. The two components of 'cross-contextual attraction', 'impulses' and 'externalising potential', are helpful to explain the precondition for and motives of the government to encourage curriculum reforms for the madrasahs in Singapore. The conception and assumptions of knowledge held by the key stakeholders of a madrasah have a direct impact on the success of internalisation/indigenization, where the policy is contextualised and becomes part of the system of education of the borrower.