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Nation-Building and Education

Author

Listed:
  • Alberto Alesina
  • Paola Giuliano
  • Bryony Reich

Abstract

Democracies and dictatorships have different incentives when it comes to choosing how much and by what means to homogenise the population, i.e., ‘to build a nation’. We study and compare nation-building policies under the transition from dictatorship to democracy in a model where the type of government and borders of the country are endogenous. We find that the threat of democratisation provides the strongest incentive to homogenise. We focus upon a specific nation-building policy: mass primary education. We offer historical discussions of nation-building across time and space, and provide correlations for a large sample of countries over the 1925–2014 period.

Suggested Citation

  • Alberto Alesina & Paola Giuliano & Bryony Reich, 2021. "Nation-Building and Education," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 131(638), pages 2273-2303.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:econjl:v:131:y:2021:i:638:p:2273-2303.
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    References listed on IDEAS

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