'One of the finest things ever written about Indonesian education and one of the wisest and most helpful things I've read about education anywhere ...' So writes an Australian expert on Indonesian Education. How did this book come about? In 7969, the Minister of Education and Culture in Indonesia set up a project to assess the whole educational system of his country as a basis for future planning. It was a massive venture involving over 1,000 field workers and producing 60 specialized reports. But, before these could be drawn together into the final official report, the subsequent Programme of educational reforms completely absorbed the energies of the Indonesian administrators who could have done the job. So Dr C. E. Beeby, who had been senior Ford Foundation consultant to the project since 1970, was invited by the Foundation, with the agreement of the Department of Education and Culture, to write his own account of the findings on primary and secondary education, and to follow up the developments in subsequent years. This he has done with characteristic vigour and forthrightness, and, to unify the mass of material, he has not hesitated to give his own interpretation of the findings and his views on their significance for the future of Indonesian education. Written with the elegance we have come to expect of Dr Beeby, wise and humane, this lively book will be welcomed far beyond Indonesia. It is a text for planning and reform everywhere.