Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Politics as a determinant of primary school provision: the case of Uruguay

  • Original Paper
  • Published:
Cliometrica Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This paper examines the relationship between school provision and the political power of the president in Uruguay between 1914 and 1954. The empirical analysis relies on fixed effects panel estimations based on newly compiled information about the partisan orientation of legislative members, electoral competition and schooling diffusion at the department-level. Ceteris paribus, I find an association between school provision and the need of government to capture votes or to obtain further legislative support. The resource allocation initially benefitted government’s core voter departments and shifted to favor non-loyal districts as an answer to the increasing intra-party political conflicts. Against the traditional historical narrative, the results point out to an influence of political interests on the diffusion of mass schooling and suggest the use of school provision as a pork barrel good over the period.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1

Source: Own computation based on data sources in Table 8

Fig. 2

Source: Own computation based on data sources in Table 8

Fig. 3

Source: Own computation based on data sources in Table 8

Fig. 4

Source: Own computation based on data sources about school provision in Table 8

Similar content being viewed by others

Availability of data and materials

The data and references used in this research come from public and free available sources.

Code availability

Available upon request.

Notes

  1. Golden and Min (2013) review more than 150 studies of distributive politics.

  2. A related—but different—literature regarding the effect of the ideology of the governing parties on public education expenditure has been subject to a lively debate in political science (Garriztmann and Seng 2016).

  3. President Latorre established a dictatorial regime from 1876 to 1879.

  4. The public schooling system achieved its complete secularization in 1909.

  5. These new regulations came into force in 1923. The Constitution also stated that women’s citizenship rights could be granted by law. This occurred in 1932.

  6. This reform has been traditionally known as the “half-half Senate” or “senado de medio y medio”.

  7. The “Colorados” are liberal, anticlerical and identified with urban areas. The Nationalists (also known as “Whites”) are more conservative and aligned to rural interests. Beyond these general features, differences in ideological background or social composition have been negligible (González 1990).

  8. The integral PR was in force until 1997 following the D’Hondt formula adjusted by the Uruguayan politician M. Halty. It implied that votes were firstly distributed among parties at the country level for both chambers. In the case of deputies (low chamber MPs), another electoral operation distributed the seats among party-factions and their lists across the 19 departments. Moreover, a final mathematical correction stated that those departments where no party/faction achieved the exact quota for a seat allocation should contribute to award a seat in others. This would maintain the most proportional system of representation as possible (Altman et al. 2011).

  9. The president’s legislative power includes her prerogative to set partial vetoes and decrees, to take budgetary decisions, to initiate the legislation and to censure or dissolve the legislature (Shugart and Carey 1992).

  10. To understand the political visibility of party-factions note that the 1933 coup d’Estat was led by a faction within the Colorado party supported by a faction of the Nationalist party (the Herreristas). Also the batllists (belonging to the governing party) and the Independent Nationalists (dissidents from the Nationalist party) abstained from voting in 1938.

  11. The historical literature identifies particular inter-party agreements between party-factions in 1938–1943; 1943–1946; 1947–1950 and 1951–1954. In the two last periods, the agreement lasted just 2 years (Zum Felde 1967; Caetano and Rilla 1995).

  12. Montevideo gathered more than half of the electorate and the Colorados were dominant throughout the period (their vote margins were over 30 pp). The number of Nationalist deputies in Montevideo ranged, roughly, between 25 and 33%.

  13. The total number of deputies was 90 until 1916, 123 for the period 1917 to 1932 and 99 from then onward. There were some exceptions in the number of elected deputies at the department level, namely Flores in 1914, 1929 and 1932 and Rio Negro in 1926 and 1929 which had one deputy.

  14. The ENF is computed as \(\frac{1}{\sum _{i=1}^{n}{\left({x}_{i}/\bar{x}\right)}^{2}}\), being \(\bar{x}\): total no. of seats; \({x}_{i}\): seats of the ith political faction.

  15. The data availability does not allow to count on the vote shares by party factions at the department level.

  16. Between 1918 and 1932 only men aged 18 and more were eligible to vote. Women were included from then onward. Due to data availability, the electorate is computed as the number of men (and men and women since 1938) older than 20 years old.

  17. Following column 2, \({\beta }_{ppp}=\) 0.688 and \({\beta }_{ppp}\times year trend=\)− 0.41, which implies that the net effect of PPP on school provision becomes negative after year 17 ( \(\frac{0.688}{0.41}=17).\) For the time series here, considered year 17 is 1930.

References

  • Aboal D, Moraes J, Oddone G (2003) La Economía Política de los Déficit Fiscales en Uruguay. In: Aboal D, Moraes J (eds) Economía Política en Uruguay: Instituciones y actores políticos en el proceso económico. Ediciones Trilce, Montevideo, pp 21–45

    Google Scholar 

  • Aboal D, Lorenzo F, Rius A (2003) Política Partidaria y Política Cambiaria: La evidencia para Uruguay desde 1920. In: Aboal D, Moraes J (eds) Economía Política en Uruguay: Instituciones y actores políticos en el proceso económico. Ediciones Trilce, Montevideo, pp 47–71

    Google Scholar 

  • Acevedo E (1934, 1936) Anales Históricos del Uruguay, Tomo V and VI. Casa Barreiro y Ramos, Montevideo

  • Alesina A, Giuliano P, Bisin A, Benhabib J (2011) Preferences for redistribution. In: Handbook of social economics, pp 93–132

  • Altman D, Buquet D, Luna JP (2011) Constitutional reforms and political turnover in Uruguay: winning Batlle, losing the war. Documento 2/11, Instituto de Ciencia Política de la Facultad de Ciencias Sociales de la Universidad de la República

  • Andersson J, Berger T (2019) Elites and the expansion of education in nineteenth-century Sweden. Econ Hist Rev 72(3):897–924. https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.12738

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ansell B, Lindvall J (2013) The political origins of primary education systems: ideology, institutions, and interdenominational conflict in an era of nation-building. Am Polit Sci Rev 107(3):505–522. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055413000257

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Anselmi J, Zaffaroni J (1941) La instrucción primaria y su régimen financiero a través de las distintas etapas de su desarrollo. Ensayo de investigación de finanzas. Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y de Administración, Universidad de la República

  • Arroyo L (2016) The limits of the estado docente: education and political participation in Peru, 1876–1940. Rev Hist Econ/J Iber Latin Ame Econ Hist 34(1):81–109. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0212610915000233

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Arroyo L, Lindert P (2017) Fiscal redistribution in latin America since the nineteenth century. In: Bértola L, Williamson J (eds) Has Latin American inequality changed direction? Looking over the long run. IDB, INTAL-LAB. SpringerOpen, pp 243–284

  • Barrán JP (1989) Historia de la sensibilidad en el Uruguay. El Disciplinamiento (1860–1920), Tomo 2. Ediciones de la Banda Oriental, Montevideo

  • Beltrán Tapia F, Martínez Galarraga J (2018) Inequality and education in pre-industrial economies: evidence from Spain. Explor Econ Hist 69:81–101. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eeh.2017.12.003

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bralich J (2011) José Pedro Varela y la gestación de la escuela uruguaya. Rev Hist Educ Latinoam 13(17):43–70

    Google Scholar 

  • Buquet D, Castellano Christy E (1995) Representación proporcional y democracia en Uruguay. Rev Urug Cienc Polít 8:107–123

    Google Scholar 

  • Caetano G, Rilla JP (1995) Relaciones inter-partidarias y gobierno en el Uruguay (1942–1973). Rev Urug Cienc Polít 8:15–34

    Google Scholar 

  • Cappelli G (2016) One size that didn’t fit all? Electoral franchise, fiscal capacity and the rise of mass schooling across Italy’s provinces, 1870–1911. Cliometrica 10:311–343. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11698-015-0133-2

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cappelli G, Vasta M (2020) Can school centralization foster human capital accumulation? A quasi-experiment from early twentieth-century Italy. Econ Hist Rev 73(1):159–184. https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.12877

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Case A (2001) Election goals and income redistribution: recent evidence from Albania. Eur Econ Rev 45:405–423. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0014-2921(00)00078-7

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Castells A, Solé A (2005) The regional allocation of infrastructure investment: the role of equity, efficiency and political factors. Eur Econ Rev 49:1165–1205. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euroecorev.2003.07.002

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chasquetti D (2010) Carreras legislativas en Uruguay: un estudio sobre reglas, partidos y legisladores en las Cámaras. Ph. D. Dissertation, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of the Republic, Uruguay

  • Chaudhary L (2009) Determinants of primary schooling in British India. J Econ Hist 69:269–302. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022050709000400

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chaudhary L, Musacchio A, Nafziger S, Yan S (2012) Big BRICs, weak foundations: the beginning of public elementary education in Brazil, Russia, India and China. Explor Econ Hist 49:221–240. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eeh.2012.02.001

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • CIDE (1965) Informe sobre el estado de la educación en Uruguay. Tomo I. Plan Nacional de Desarrollo Económico y Social 1965–74, Montevideo

  • Cinnirella F, Hornung E (2016) Landownership concentration and the expansion of education. J Dev Econ 121:135–152. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2016.03.001

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cinnirella F, Schueler R (2018) Nation building: The role of central spending in education. Explor Econ Hist 67:19–39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eeh.2017.08.002

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Coatsworth JH (1993) Notes on the Comparative Economic History of Latin America and the United States. In: Bernecker W, Werner H (eds) Development and underdevelopment in America: contrasts of economic growth in North and Latin America in historical perspective. Walter de Gruyter, New York, pp 10–30

    Google Scholar 

  • Cox G (2010) Swing voters, core voters, and distributive politics. In: Shapiro I, Stokes S, Wood E, Kirshner A (eds) Political representation. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp 342–357

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Cox G, McCubbins M (1986) Electoral Politics as a redistributive game. J Polit 48(2):370–389. https://doi.org/10.2307/2131098

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Curto M, Herranz A, Solé A (2012) Pork-Barrel politics in semi-democracies: the Spanish “parliamentary roads” 1880–1914. J Econ Hist 72(3):771–796. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022050712000368

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cvrcek T, Zajicek M (2019) The rise of public schooling in nineteenth-century Imperial Austria: who gained and who paid? Cliometrica 13:367–403. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11698-018-0180-6

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dahlberg M, Johansson E (2002) On the vote-purchasing behavior of incumbent governments. Am Polit Sci Rev 96:27–40. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055402004215

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dixit A, Londregan J (1998) Ideology, tactics, and efficiency in redistributive politics. Q J Econ 113:497–529. https://doi.org/10.1162/003355398555667

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Elis R (2011) Redistribution under oligarchy: trade, regional inequality and the origins of public schooling in Argentina, 1862–1912. Ph.D. Dissertation, Department of Political Science, Stanford University

  • Engerman S, Sokoloff K (2005) The evolution of suffrage institutions in the new world. J Econ Hist 65(4):891–921. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022050705000343

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Filgueira F (1995) A century of social welfare in Uruguay. Growth to the limit of the Batllista social state. Democracy and Social Policy Series, Working Paper 5. Kellogg Institute

  • Filgueira C, Filgueira F (1994) El largo adiós al país modelo. Políticas sociales y pobreza en el Uruguay. Editorial Arca, Montevideo

    Google Scholar 

  • Forteza A (2003) Seguridad social y competencia política. Documento 04/03, Facultad de Ciencias Sociales, Departamento de Economía, Universidad de la República

  • Frankema E (2009) The expansion of mass education in twentieth century Latin America: a global comparative perspective. Rev Hist Econ/J Iber Latin Am Econ Hist 27(03):359–396. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0212610900000811

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fuentes-Vásquez MJ (2019) Educational disparities in Colombia 1904–58: new evidence from a regional level approach. Rev Hist Econ J Iber Latin Am Econ Hist 37(3):443–478. https://doi.org/10.1017/S021261091800023X

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Galor O, Moav O (2006) Das human-kapital: a theory of the demise of the class structure. Rev Econ Stud 73(1):85–117. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-937X.2006.00370

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Galor O, Moav O, Vollrath D (2009) Inequality in landownership, the emergence of human-capital promoting institutions and the Great Divergence. Rev Econ Stud 76(1):143–179. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-937X.2008.00506.x

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Garriztmann J, Seng K (2016) Party politics and education spending: challenging some common wisdom. J Eur Publ Policy 23(4):510–530. https://doi.org/10.1080/13501763.2015.1048703

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Go S, Lindert P (2010) The uneven rise of american public schools to 1850. J Econ Hist 70:1–26. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022050710000033

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Golden M, Min B (2013) Distributive politics around the world. Ann Rev Polit Sci 16:73–99. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-polisci-052209-121553

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Golden M, Picci L (2008) Pork-barrel politics in postwar Italy, 1953–94. Am J Polit Sci 52(2):268–289. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5907.2007.00312.x

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Goñi M (2018) Landed elites and public education in England and Wales. evidence from school boards, 1870–99. Unpublished manuscript

  • González L (1990) Legislación electoral y sistemas de partidos: el caso uruguayo. Rev Urug Cienc Polít 4:9–27

    Google Scholar 

  • Grob U, Walter S (2007) Demographic change and public education spending: a conflict between young and old? Educ Econ 15(3):277–292. https://doi.org/10.1080/09645290701273467

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Laakso M, Taafepera R (1979) Effective number of parties: a measure with application to West Europe. Comp Pol Stud 12(1):3–27. https://doi.org/10.1177/001041407901200101

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lanzaro J (2004) Fundamentos de la democracia pluralista y estructura política del Estado en el Uruguay. Rev Urug Cienc Polít 14:103–135

    Google Scholar 

  • Levitt S, Snyder J (1995) political parties and the distribution of federal outlays. Am J Polit Sci 39(4):958–980. https://doi.org/10.2307/2111665

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lindbeck A, Weibull J (1987) Balanced budget redistribution and the outcome of political competition. Public Choice 52:273–297. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00116710

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lindert P (2004) Growing public: social spending and economic growth since the eighteenth century. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Lindert P (2010) The unequal lag in Latin American schooling since 1900: follow the money. Rev Hist Econ/J Iber Latin Am Econ Hist 28(02):375–405. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0212610910000066

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mariscal E, Sokoloff S (2000) Schooling, suffrage, and the persistence of inequality in the Americas, 1800–1945. In: Haber S (ed) Political institutions and economic growth in Latin America. Hoover Institution Press, Stanford, pp 159–217

    Google Scholar 

  • Martinez-Galarraga J, Rodríguez Miranda A, Willebald H (2020) Patterns of regional income distribution in Uruguay (1872–2012): a story of agglomeration, natural resources and public policies. In: Tirado-Fabregat DA, Badia-Miró M, Willebald H (eds) Time and space. Palgrave Studies in Economic History. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-47553-6_11

  • MEC, Ministerio de Educación y Cultura (2014) 140 años de la educación del pueblo: aportes para la reflexión sobre la educación en Uruguay, Tomo I. MEC, Montevideo

  • Mitchell BR (1998) International historical statistics: the Americas, 1750–1993. Macmillan Press, London

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Monestier F (1999) Partidos por dentro: La fraccionalización de los partidos políticos en el Uruguay (1954–1994). In Fundación de Cultura Universitaria (ed) Los partidos políticos uruguayos en tiempos de cambio, Montevideo, pp 19–86

  • Moraes JA (2008) Why factions? Candidate selection and legislative politics in Uruguay. In: Siavelis P, Morgestern S (eds) Pathways to power political recruitment and candidate selection in Latin America. Penn State University Press

  • Nohlen D (1993) Enciclopedia electoral latinoamericana y del Caribe. Instituto Interamericano de Derechos Humanos, San José de Costa Rica

    Google Scholar 

  • Piñeiro R (2004) Elección de diputados y fraccionalización partidaria en Uruguay, 1942–1999. Revista Uruguaya de Ciencia Política 14:15–42

    Google Scholar 

  • Rama G (1970) El club político. Bolsilibros Arca, Montevideo

    Google Scholar 

  • Real de Azúa C (1964) El impulso y su freno. Ediciones de la Banda Oriental, Montevideo

    Google Scholar 

  • Shugart M, Carey J (1992) Presidents and assemblies. Constitutional design and electoral dynamics. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Stokes SC (2005) Perverse accountability: a formal model of machine politics with evidence from Argentina. Am Polit Sci Rev 99(3):315–325. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055405051683

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stokes SC, Dunning T, Nazareno M, Brusco V (2011) Buying votes: distributive politics in democracies. Unpublished manuscript, Department of Political Sciences, Yale University

  • Vaishnav M, Sircar N (2010) The politics of pork: building schools and rewarding voters in Tamil Nadu. Unpublished manuscript. Department of Political Sciences, Columbia University

  • Wallis J (1998) The political economy of New Deal spending revisited again: with and without Nevada. Explor Econ Hist 35:140–170. https://doi.org/10.1006/exeh.1998.0695

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wright G (1974) The political economy of New Deal spending. Rev Econ Stat 59:30–38. https://doi.org/10.2307/1927524

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zum Felde A (1967) Proceso histórico del Uruguay. Arca, Montevideo

    Google Scholar 

  • Zurbriggen C (2006) Estado, empresarios y redes rentistas durante el proceso sustitutivo de importaciones en Uruguay. Los condicionantes históricos de las reformas actuales. Editorial Banda Oriental, Montevideo

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

I am particularly grateful to Alfonso Herranz Loncan for his valued comments and advice and to Gabriele Cappelli, Sergio Espuelas Barroso and Matías Brum for their suggestions. Thanks to the participants of the Uruguayan Association for Economic History conference (2018), the European Historical Economics Society conference (2019) and those of the seminar of the Department of Economic History at Universitat de Barcelona (2019). I am also very thankful to the two anonymous reviewers and the editor for insightful comments that significantly improved the paper. All errors are my own responsibility.

Funding

A former version of this document was written with the financial support of the Grant Program “Personal Investigador en Formació” (12a. Convocatòria), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Economics, Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay

    Paola Azar

Authors
  1. Paola Azar
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Paola Azar.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Publisher's Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Appendix

Appendix

See Tables 8, 9, 10 and 11 and Fig. 5.

Table 8 Data sources
Full size table
Table 9 Public primary education indicators by department (average 1914–1954).
Full size table
Table 10 Political determinants of school provision changing the dependent variable
Full size table
Table 11 Political determinants of school provision changing control variables
Full size table
Fig. 5
figure 5

Uruguay in the South American region

Full size image

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Azar, P. Politics as a determinant of primary school provision: the case of Uruguay. Cliometrica 16, 333–367 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11698-021-00228-3

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11698-021-00228-3

Keywords

JEL Classification

Search

Navigation