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What Happens to Policies When Assuming Institutions? A Short Story About Romania’s Never-Ending Educational Reform

Over the past decades, educational reform has been one of the centerpieces of transition in Central and Eastern Europe. A huge degree of variability among countries exists, from sudden liberalization to securing the status quo previous to revolutionary political change. Reforms have ranged from institutional to instrumental changes. We argue that policies may lead to undesirable outcomes, when they assume a certain institutional framework. We then describe the evolution of Romania’s educational system, focusing on a case study of an implemented large-scale policy program: the Rural Education Project for Romania. We thus argue that by assuming institutional change such attempts are bound to fail because the existing status quo adapts actions to existing practices, thus leading to unexpected outcomes.