Territorial Inequality in Education

While most research on social inequality has focused on inequality between individuals, there is a growing recognition of the importance of territorial inequality. Disparities in outcomes, resources, and opportunities across the different parts of a country pose significant challenges to democratic governance and trust, undermining territorial cohesion and fueling territorial grievances and secessionist movements. There is a strong assumption in the literature on multilevel systems that decentralization is a major driver of territorial inequality, and that policy variation is the causal mechanism. However, this relationship has not been systematically examined. This paper seeks to investigate whether decentralization really drives territorial inequality, focusing on education, a key policy area and source of individual and societal prosperity (Carstensen and Emmenegger, 2023). To examine the relationship between decentralization, policy variation, and territorial inequality, the paper first develops two indicators to systematically measure the type and level of decentralization of education policy (Decentralization of Education Index) and policy variation in education (Policy Variation in Education Index) – concentrating on the levels of education that are considered key drivers of (in)equality as they affect the entire cohort: primary and secondary education. Second, the paper builds on these two indices to a) discuss the relationship between decentralization of authority over education and variation in education policy and its implications for territorial inequality in education and b) present preliminary empirical findings from several OECD countries using both quantitative and qualitative comparative analysis. In so doing, the paper provides a methodological contribution to studies aimed at disentangling the relationship between policy provision and territorial inequality in individual policy areas. By focusing specifically on education, the paper also provides insights into the variation and potential impact of one of the most important drivers of social, political, and economic inequality.