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Education and political participation: the impact of educational environments

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Abstract

What are the effects of educational environments on individual-level political participation? There is abundant evidence that education at the individual level affects political participation. However, we lack studies that systematically link the effect of individual-level education to that of the environment. For example, what are the effects of being a member of a high vs. low education community? Using a dataset composed of a Norwegian citizen survey comprising more than 11,000 respondents living in 414 municipalities, we relate the effect of education at the individual level to that of the educational environment. The analyses reveal that the educational gap is smaller in high-educated environments and is in fact neutralized in those municipalities that have the greatest share of educated citizens. Thus, the Norwegian case lends support to the relative educational model; the higher the level of education in the environment, the smaller the effect of individual-level education. Judging from our study, citizens with few resources are not lifted by their environment, but educated citizens tend to free-ride in resourceful environments.

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Notes

  1. As noted, it is not necessarily easy to determine the categories for different acts of participation. It can be argued that becoming a party member is an individual decision, and it can be argued that contacting may be a byproduct of a collective political process. Moreover, it has been observed that the two forms of participation are cumulative rather than differentiated; that is, persons who are active contactors are also likely to be party members (Aars and Strømsnes 2007).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Administration and Organization Theory, University of Bergen, PO Box 7802, 5007, Bergen, Norway

    Jacob Aars

  2. Uni Research Rokkan Centre, PO Box 7810, 5020, Bergen, Norway

    Jacob Aars & Dag Arne Christensen

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  1. Jacob Aars
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  2. Dag Arne Christensen
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Correspondence to Jacob Aars.

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Aars, J., Christensen, D.A. Education and political participation: the impact of educational environments. Acta Polit 55, 86–102 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41269-018-0101-5

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