Principal investigator: Adriano Valladão
Article title: EDUCATION AND MILITARY RIVALRY
Article authors: Philippe Aghion, Xavier Jaravel, Torsten Persson and Dorothee Rouzet
Location of the InterventionA group of countries
Sample Size: 3.140 observations
Sector: Education
Type of InterventionThe relationship between education and the military threat.
Main Variable of InterestPrimary school enrollments
Evaluation method: Experimental Evaluation (RCT)
Policy Problem
What are the reasons that lead countries to undertake mass educational reforms? One explanation lies in its relevance to the military field. Mass education would be important to unify the multiplicity of dialects spoken in the same region, promote a set of moral principles and discipline, teach basic reading and comprehension skills, and transmit patriotic values.
Evaluation Context
The historical examples of France, Japan, and China illustrate the relationship between education and military spending, and highlight the role of democracies and autocracies in the process of educational expansion.
FranceIn 1870, investments in education were primarily in the private and religious spheres, lagging behind those in Prussia and other European countries. After the defeat in the war against Prussia, which culminated in the end of the Second Empire, one of the explanations given was the superiority of Prussian schools and universities. A consensus formed that the French educational system should be reformed, which happened in the 1880s. The cost of enrollment in public primary schools was eliminated, enrollment of children between 6 and 13 years old became mandatory, more schools were built, and roads were paved to facilitate access. This resulted in an increase in enrollment numbers, literacy jumped from 80% to 96% of the population, and a growth in patriotic sentiment.
JapanUntil the mid-19th century, Japan was ruled by shoguns And education was a privilege of the samurai. In the mid-1850s, the Western threat to the country's sovereignty catalyzed structural changes, resulting in a civil war with the insurgents taking control in 1868. The ensuing change in education aimed to modernize Japanese society and was based on Western values such as mass schooling as a source of economic and military power. Among the measures were the introduction of a compulsory primary education system for all children, an increase in the number of schools, and teacher training. Despite initial resistance to change, perhaps due to the absence of democracy, primary school enrollment became virtually universal, and the literacy rate jumped from 35% to 75% for men and from 8% to 68% for women.
ChinaIn the first half of the 19th century, the Chinese situation was similar to that of Japan regarding the military threat of loss of sovereignty to Western nations. Despite recognizing Western technology, weapons, and education, there was a notion that radical reform would affect the existing social hierarchy. Therefore, gradual educational reforms were adopted, attempting to incorporate foreign knowledge through the translation of books and engineering training in Western countries. A defeat by Japan in 1895 accelerated institutional changes and reforms; the University of Peking, focused on science and designed to change the existing system of norms, was created, and plans for a national education system were in place. However, a conservative coup d'état in 1898 halted the ongoing changes, although they served as a basis for further reforms.
Intervention Details
The historical contexts of France, Japan, and China illustrate how concern about military incidents can affect reforms in primary education. The importance of political regimes is also noted, comparing democracies with autocracies in the success of reforms. In practice, to study the relationship between military events and educational reforms in a generalized way, it is necessary to look at the data. Annual information was collected on 166 countries between 1830 and 2010. Education was measured by the number of enrollments per 10.000 inhabitants, while a threat of war indicated whether the country had been at war in the last 10 years or not. As this measure can end up missing some conflicts, the idea of rivalry was also explored, capturing the risk of armed conflict if a country has a rival of significant size and strength. Information on the political regime came from the Polity IV database, in which each country receives a score each year regarding the competitiveness and openness of the executive branch. In addition, other relevant elements such as military spending, population size, urbanization rate, and GDP were collected.
Methodology Details
With all the information described above, it is possible to measure the relationship between military events and mass schooling. The idea of this exercise is that, by adding all the relevant information for the increase in the number of enrollments in a country, the desired relationship is obtained without incorporating the effects of other factors. Given the objective of the investigation, the two main parameters of interest measure the relationship between the number of enrollments in primary education in countries, both with the imminence of a war or military tension and with the interaction between military rivalry and political regime.
Results
The results indicate that investment in education, measured by the number of enrollments in primary education, has a positive relationship with the military, whether this is accounted for by participation in war in the last 10 years or by rivalry or imminence of armed conflict. Furthermore, investment in education is negatively correlated with democracy, but such investments respond more quickly to military threats in a democracy.
The rationale for investing in education was that a more educated population would have more effective soldiers in a war. To analyze this hypothesis, the data shows that military rivalry and a higher number of primary school enrollments increase the chance of entering and winning a war in the next 10 years. These results corroborate the idea that mass education is related to more effective armies.
Finally, it should be noted that military conflicts existed for a long time without any implication for mass education; however, the advent of the industrial revolution and the development of weapons technology changed this need. When evaluating the role of industry, it is found that the dynamic between military spending and education is indeed positive for countries with a minimum level of industrialization. The development of war technology brought about by the industrial revolution suggests a greater importance for educated soldiers, reinforcing the role of acquiring basic skills.
Lessons in Public Policy
Mass education and military spending are positively correlated by teaching basic skills to soldiers, promoting group discipline, and/or providing patriotic values. The study teaches that this relationship is indeed positive, that the relationship between democracies and primary school enrollment is negative, but that education responds more strongly to military threats in democracies. These teachings are valid for modern societies where the level of industrialization is above a certain threshold. Finally, it should be emphasized that such a correlation should not be seen as causality; just as higher education would generate greater military value, it could be the case that the pursuit of military power encourages greater schooling.
Reference
Aghion, Philippe; Jaravel, X.; Persson, T.; Rouzet, D. “Education and military rivalry.” Journal of the European Economic Association, vol. 17, no. 2, p. 376-412, 2019.
