Historical Development of Education Systems: Motivations and Consequences

Session Submission Type: Full Paper Panel

Session Description

Education systems have gained growing interest in political science. This panel examines the complex motivations for education system development as well as the impact of education policies on politics. While past scholarship has focused on explaining the factors driving the expansion of mass schooling, three papers in this panel seek to explain other aspects of education systems. Paglayan, Neundorf and Kim draw on a new dataset spanning 163 countries from 1945-2021 to examine whether democratization has an impact on the content of education. Their findings suggest that non-democratic rulers have often captured democratic transitions and prevented changes in the extent of school indoctrination. Del Río, Adrián, Carl Henrik Knutsen, Philipp M. Lutscher draw on a new cross-national dataset from 1789 to the present to examine the introduction of compulsory schooling. They show that compulsory schooling was primarily introduced under non-democratic regimes, but also uncover clear regime differences in terms of whether or not the entire population is covered by compulsory education or whether particular groups are excluded. Martin draws from a database of over 1000 fictional works from 1700 to 1920 in Britain and Denmark to examine the cultural preconditions for the development of higher education systems. In particular, she shows that historical cultural depictions of education influenced the inclusion of vocational training programs in systems of higher learning and that these educational choices influenced measures of socioeconomic equality. The fourth paper, by Lawrimore, examines the unintended consequences of education desegregation policies for political violence. It shows that when courts ordered Southern school districts in the United States to integrate racially during the 1960s, this led the Klu Klux Klan to intensify its activities.

Sub Unit

• Division 7: Politics and History

Individual Presentations

• Democratization and Indoctrination - Agustina S. Paglayan, UCSD; Anja Neundorf, Unveristy of Glasgow; Wooseok Kim, University of Glasgow

• Education Policies and Systems across Modern History: A Global Dataset - Carl Henrik Knutsen, Department of Political Science, University of Oslo; Adrian del Rio, Center for East and International Studies; Philipp Lutscher, University of Oslo

• Equality, Skills and the Culture of Higher Learning - Cathie Jo Martin, Boston University Political Science

• School Integration and the Re-emergence of the Ku Klux Klan - Trellace Lawrimore, New York University

Chair

• David Stasavage New York University

Discussant

• Daniel Tichenor University of Oregon