A number of recent studies have expressed concern at the low level of both political knowledge and political engagement of young people. The main objective of this paper is to study what kinds of factors related to home and school environment affect political knowledge among the young. Using the IEA Civic Education Study, this paper focuses on Finnish 15-year-old pupils, who were undertaking their last year of comprehensive school. The results of the structural equation modeling point out that pupil’s experience of civic education interesting proved to be the strongest predictor for political knowledge followed by political participation and having reading material at home. It is important to acknowledge the role of school environment as a leveller of the playing field. In other words, the role of civic education can become very important for those pupils whose families are politically passive.
