Educational Disparities and Conflict: Evidence from Lebanon

Abstract

This article examines the impact of Lebanon's civil war (1975–1991) on disparities in education among the country's main religious sects and across various regions. District of registration is adopted as a proxy for religious affiliation through a novel, detailed classification to assess sectarian differentials by region and regional differentials within each major religious group. Findings show that the civil war helped close the gender gap in education across various sects/regions, presumably because many young men joined militias. However, the education of Muslims still lags behind that of Christians. Intra-sectarian disparities remain very pronounced, especially among Sunni Muslims. The article shows that Lebanon's regional and sectarian inequalities that pre-dated the civil war have been largely maintained. The civil war and its aftermath, however, have led to some shift in the balance of power and to some changes in the ranking of particular sects and regions. Drawing upon the work of Weber and Lenski, the authors argue that sectarian/regional inequalities in education in Lebanon are the product of disparities in economic power and differential access to the state resources among the various regions and sects. They conclude by discussing the future of educational inequalities in Lebanon.