Genesis and rationale of the programme

The Master and Back programme was designed by Regional Budget Assessore Francesco Pigliaru and, in 2005, it was endorsed by the centre-left regional government led by Renato Soru. As shown by the flowchart below, the scheme consists of two steps: the Master and the Back. The Master provides applicants who get selected with the possibility to receive grants to undertake postgraduate education in the most prestigious universities outside of Sardinian – be they in Italy or abroad (Higher Education part of the programme), or to pursue internships in prestigious non-

14

Over the period 2008-2012, the mean salary per hour in Sardinia was about 4% lower than in the other Italian regions. According to the Banca d'Italia (2013) this difference is only partly explained by observable covariates (education, age, firm’s size, citizenship, gender and sectoral workforce composition). In fact, after controlling for these covariates, the differential is still high and significant: -3.4%.

15 _{Moreover, it must be noted that most of this percentage refers to a single plant operating in the refining}

42 Sardinian organizations (Internships part of the programme). Upon completion of their study experiences or internships, the Back grants economic incentives to the recipients of the Master16 to lure them back to work in Sardinia, where it is hoped they will apply and diffuse their new knowledge.

Despite the fact that the scheme is divided into 3 sub-schemes, this work focuses on just one of them: Higher Education outside Sardinia (or, more simply, Higher Education). This decision was in part forced by the fact that suitable data were only available for this part of the scheme, and in part consciously taken to narrow the research focus.

Figure 1.1 – Structure of the Master and Back programme and research focus

So far, according to a conservative estimate by the Banca d'Italia (2013, p. 45), more than 100 million euros have been spent by the regional government on the scheme. The calls have been released regularly from 2006 to present, but in this thesis we only focus on the calls between 2006 and 2009 (overall 4) since, when the data for this study were collected, the calls after 2009 were too recent to be evaluated.

The rationale of the scheme emerges in part from the official documents and in part from the accounts provided by the policy-makers who introduced it, particularly

16 _{Also who has not participated to the “Master” part of the programme but has achieved postgraduate}

education or has done internships outside Sardinia is eligible to the programme. However, in practice very few application of this kind have been submitted.

43 Francesco Pigliaru. According to the official documents the M&B programme aims to raise the indicators of education and training of the Sardinian population up to the European average. The programme is expected to strengthen, diversify and make more accessible postgraduate education as well as vocational training in order to provide young Sardinian graduates with the possibility to study in world-class universities and to pursue internships in firms and organizations of great reputation outside Sardinia. Furthermore, the programme is also expected to favour the return of recipients upon completion of their studies and their placement in the regional labour market17. The official documents make it very clear that the scheme is meant to be coherent with the Lisbon Strategy, in particular with the strategic goal of filling the gap between Europe and its global competitors in the levels of training and education: two key elements to generate knowledge and stimulate innovation18.

Given these characteristics, M&B can be considered a classic EU LM policy. Its underlying objectives, consistently with Human Capital Theory, postulate a great deal of trust in education and training as key assets for better careers and to escape exclusion traps. Moreover, it aims to encourage the recipients of the scheme to return to their sending region upon completion of their studies. In other words, M&B is a win win policy which simultaneously aims to improve the efficiency of the European labour market, consistently with the Lisbon Strategy, and to support virtuous processes of local economic development in lagging regions by increasing the local stock of human capital.

Yet, there is also another reason underlying the introduction of the scheme, which though not explicitly mentioned by the official documents, emerges from other sources: the rationalising of ESF expenditure. According to Francesco Pigliaru, interviewed by a local newspaper, before M&B began significant shares of ESF resources were spent to implement highly inefficient vocational training courses (Pinna, 2010). They were specifically allocated to institutes of vocational training selected with little transparency

17 _{Source: Call M&B 2006.} 18

“Gli orientamenti comunitari inseriscono le politiche dell’istruzione e della formazione al centro della creazione e della trasmissione delle conoscenze, in quanto elemento determinante delle potenzialità d’innovazione della società.

I segnali d’allarme sulla situazione dei sistemi d’istruzione e formazione europei e sulle loro debolezze strutturali sottolineano l’urgenza di riforme e interventi che portino l’Europa a riassorbire i divari accumulati in termini di investimenti nella società della conoscenza rispetto a competitors come Stati Uniti e Giappone, nonché la necessità di perseguire in modo più deciso la Strategia di Lisbona” Source: Call M&B 2006.

44 and characterised by very bad value for money: M&B was supposed to overcome these shortcomings. In fact, Pigliaru stated that M&B is worth more than “one thousand incentives to the enterprises and more than one thousand or ten thousand vocational training courses” (Logosardigna, 2010).

The introduction of the scheme was also prepared by the Regional Operative Programme mid-term review which, probably influenced by the debate on the necessity to support the Lisbon objectives also by means of Cohesion Funds (Begg, 2010, Mendez, 2011), pushed the managing authority of the scheme to modify the Regional Operative Programme in a consistent way with the Lisbon Strategy. In fact, according to the official document providing advice on how the Regional Operative Programme was to be reviewed, in Sardinia there was “elevated demand of high level specialization which had to be fulfilled as soon as possible by the ESF" (ISRI, 2003).

1.5.3 Description of the programme: official documents and