Title: From education to democracy?
Description: The conventional wisdom views high levels of education as a prerequisite for democracy. This paper shows that existing evidence for this view is based on cross-sectional correlations, which disappear once we look at within-country variation. In other words, there is no evidence that countries that increase their education are more likely to become democratic. Keywords: democracy, education, institutions, political development. JEL Classifications: P16, O10.