Working Paper Series,
Research Institute of Industrial Economics

Abstract: We exploit education reforms in Sweden and other European countries to estimate the causal effects of longer and modernized compulsory education on civic engagement. In most countries, compulsory education was extended by 1–2 years, and the curricula were reformed to better foster democratic and socially responsible citizens. We use high-quality, population-wide register data from Sweden and survey data from the other countries on key measures of civic engagement: voting in elections, charitable giving, and blood donations. Our estimates are generally precise and close to zero, allowing us to rule out even comparatively small positive effects. These results suggest that the post-WWII education reforms in Europe under study were unsuccessful in fostering more civic-minded citizens, and the additional years of schooling attributed to these reforms did not contribute to the positive association between educational attainment and civic engagement also observed in the data.

Keywords: Education reforms; Civic engagement; Prosocial behaviour; Political participation; Voting; Charitable giving; Blood donation

JEL-codes: D64; D73; I21; N34

Language: English

43 pages, January 2, 2025

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