A Field Study of the Politics of Fiscal Decision-Making in a Dependent Urban School District

Formal organizations or social subsystems are defined in this anthropological field study as the municipal government and the urban school district. The school district is fiscally dependent on the municipal government for the financial resources essential for its operations. Within the realm of educational finance, policy decisions of either of these organizations directly affect the other. This interdependent characteristic influences the type and quality of the formal and informal relationships existing between the local government and the school district. This study is concerned with the identification and analysis of the decisionmaking process in a large city as it relates to the allocation of financial resources between the education and noneducation services. (Author)