Wartime Educational Loss and Attitudes Towards Democratic Institutions

• In Event: Democratization in the Shadow of Civil War: Parties, Warriors, and Voters

Abstract

How does civil war affect society and citizen interaction with politics? While studies of political violence and post-war reconstruction focus largely on reconciliation between warring groups and societal rehabilitation, civilians who live through warfare face numerous other challenges to everyday life that can have permanent effects on society even after peace is achieved. This project uses qualitative fieldwork and quantitative data on the two Liberian civil wars (1989-1997, 1999-2003) to examine the impact of war through one channel – disruptions in educational attainment for an entire generation of children – and hypothesizes that such disruptions will have detrimental effects on political engagement and attitudes towards democracy.

Combining the 2008 Liberian census and three rounds of Afrobarometer data, I employ a differences-in-differences design to compare the effects of war on education in areas that previously had high primary school enrollment to areas that already received little formal schooling prior to war. Results show that children who were of school age during war are differentially less likely to have any formal schooling by the end of war; this effect is doubly felt by female children, thus exacerbating already unequal education attainment. I further show that education deficiencies in this particular generation of young adults extends to the political sphere, such that those who lost out on educational opportunities due to war exhibit lower civic engagement and trust in the legitimacy of democratic institutions. Taken together, these outcomes make the case that democratic transition and trust in civilian government after civil war hinges on myriad factors beyond maintaining the peace: specifically in this case, reconstruction should increase efforts to rebuild the school system and encourage schooling among young adults, so as to minimize attitudinal shifts and aid post-war democratization.

Author

• Shelley Xuan Liu, Harvard University