City size, borrowed size and institutional educational supply: Evidence from the Fergana economic region, Uzbekistan
This study analyzes educational institutional supply across five cities in Uzbekistan's Fergana region, revealing that while composite indices mask significant imbalances, a decomposed analysis shows a weak relationship between city size and provision, a U-shaped disparity pattern across educational levels, and the utility of borrowed size and agglomeration shadow frameworks for understanding service distribution in data-scarce Central Asian contexts.
Original paper licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). This is an AI-generated explanation of the paper below. It is not written or endorsed by the authors. For technical accuracy, refer to the original paper. Read full disclaimer
Imagine the Fergana Valley in Uzbekistan as a bustling, crowded neighborhood where five major cities—Namangan, Andijan, Fergana, Kokand, and Margilan—are huddled together, all within a hundred kilometers of each other. They are so close they practically share a backyard. Now, imagine someone tries to grade these cities on how "livable" they are by giving them a single, giant scorecard. This paper argues that giving them one score is like judging a five-course meal by its average temperature: it tells you nothing about whether the soup is cold or the steak is burnt.
The researchers decided to peek under the hood of the "education" part of these scorecards. Instead of just looking at the total number of schools, they broke it down into four distinct layers: preschool, general secondary school, vocational training, and universities. They counted how many institutions existed for every 10,000 people in each city.
The Big Reveal: Size Doesn't Always Mean Strength
You might think the biggest city, Namangan (with 713,400 people), would have the best education setup. But the data tells a different story. When you look at the density of schools per person, Namangan actually ranks third. It's like having a massive library with millions of books, but if the city's population is growing faster than the library can add shelves, the average person ends up with less space. The study found that a city's population size only loosely predicts how well it is served; sometimes the biggest city is actually the most crowded and under-served.
The "U-Shape" of Inequality
Here is where it gets interesting. The researchers found that the gap between the "haves" and "have-nots" isn't a straight line. It looks like a "U" shape.
- The Bottom of the U: At the compulsory level (general secondary schools), the cities are surprisingly even. It's like a neighborhood where every block has a playground; the government makes sure everyone gets one, so the disparity is low (only 14.2% variation).
- The Sides of the U: As you move to the ends of the ladder—preschool on one side and universities on the other—the gap explodes. For universities, the difference between the best city and the worst is unbounded. One city, Margilan, has zero universities, while another has a healthy number. The variation here is huge, reaching 71.8%.
The "Shadow" City
The most fascinating character in this story is Margilan. It's a city of about 257,900 people, sitting right next to a bigger neighbor, Fergana. The researchers suggest Margilan is living in an "agglomeration shadow." Think of it like a small tree growing in the shadow of a giant oak; the giant oak (Fergana) soaks up all the sunlight (resources and universities), so the small tree (Margilan) stops trying to grow its own. Margilan has no universities and very few preschools. However, it does have a strong vocational training system, likely because its local industry (silk and textiles) needs those specific skills. The paper suggests this shadow isn't a permanent curse but a specific result of how the region is planned, and it might be reversible if the cities decide to share resources better.
The "One-Size-Fits-All" Trap
The paper explicitly argues against the idea that a single "Education Score" is useful. If you just averaged everything up, you'd miss the fact that every single city has a "lopsided" profile.
- Fergana is great at universities and secondary schools but weaker elsewhere.
- Andijan is a preschool powerhouse but struggles with secondary schools.
- Namangan has a huge number of schools in total, but per person, it's struggling with vocational and higher education.
No city is balanced. A single score would hide these critical imbalances, making it look like everything is "fine" when, in reality, specific needs are being ignored.
How Sure Are We?
The researchers are very confident in their ranking of the cities. They tested their math in three different ways: changing the weight they gave to different school types, removing one type of school at a time, and using different ways to calculate the scores. In every single test, the order of the cities stayed exactly the same: Fergana and Andijan were at the top, Namangan and Kokand in the middle, and Margilan at the bottom.
However, the paper is careful to say what it doesn't know. It measured the number of buildings, not the quality of the education inside them, nor how far a student has to travel to get there. It suggests that Margilan's lack of universities might be compensated by its residents traveling to Fergana to study (a concept called "borrowed size"), but the paper cannot prove this because it didn't measure travel times or student flows. It's a strong hint, not a final verdict.
The Takeaway
The main lesson is that to fix a city's education problems, you can't just look at the total score. You have to look at the specific gaps. If you are a city planner, you shouldn't just build more schools everywhere; you need to know that Namangan needs more vocational spots, Kokand needs more preschools, and Margilan needs to either build its own universities or figure out how to easily send its students to the neighbor next door. The paper offers a clear, data-light tool to spot these hidden cracks, proving that in the world of city planning, the devil is always in the details.
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