This report analyzes some of the conditions necessary for successful educational planning with emphasis on political and administrative conditions that tend to make the educational planner's task more difficult. The research and experience are drawn from Latin America. The author suggests that educational planners should seek ways of working with general planners and reformers of public administration, thereby enlisting outside support for educational planning and avoiding direct confrontation with the educational powers. The report also warns against planning in a highly institutionalized context, emphasizing that planning on a more ad hoc basis could provide the flexibility necessary for taking advantage of minor planning successes as they occur and for avoiding direct confrontation with events likely to delay or even to destroy planning endeavors.