Comparative Politics Workshop: Suna Buse, "The Effect of Compulsory Education on Political Behaviors: Evidence from Turkey," Wednesday, March 24, 11:45am-1:45pm

Comparative Politics Workshop: Suna Buse, “The Effect of Compulsory Education on Political Behaviors: Evidence from Turkey,” Wednesday, March 24, 11:45am-1:45pm

Please join the Comparative Politics Workshop virtually via Zoom on Wednesday, March 24 from 11:45am-1:45pm (EST). Our very own Suna Buse will be presenting her paper on “The Effect of Compulsory Education on Political Behaviors: Evidence from Turkey.” Support your peers and engage in a lively discussion. Unfortunately, there is no free wine (but you may provide your own). Feel free to bring a bagged lunch, as it is that time of day!
To receive a copy of the paper, as well as a link to the event, kindly email gccomparative@gmail.com.

Abstract

A vast literature investigating industrialized and democratic  countries indicates that a higher level of education boosts various political behaviors, such as political participation and concern. However, the causal effect of education on political behaviors can differ in non-democratic settings due to the existence of weak institutions, limited accountability, and strong centralized power in non-democratic regimes. In this paper, I exploit a change in the compulsory schooling law in an electoral authoritarian setting, Turkey, to examine the impact of an increase in people’s average years of schooling on their voting behavior, political involvement, and political concern by using a regression discontinuity design. The analysis shows that the new policy led to 6-12 percentage and 7-15 percentage increase in the average likelihood of citizens’ political participation and political concern, respectively. Therefore, this paper provides substantial evidence on the role of higher level of schooling in political behaviors using the competitive authoritarian context. Filling in the gap is substantial for drawing a complete picture in the component of democratization literature.