I thank Robert Kaufman, Stephan Haggard, Richard Lau, and Michael Shafer, as well as reviewers and editors of the Journal of East Asian Studies for their extremely helpful comments and suggestions. I am also grateful to Barak Hoffman, Alex Segura-Ubiergo, David Lehmkuhl, Dennis Quinn, David Brown, Luke Keele, and subscribers of the political methodology list for assistance with data collection and statistical modeling.Google Scholar

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21. Based on the standard Polity score, South Korea, Taiwan, the Philippines, and Thailand experienced democratic transition in the late 1980s and Indonesia in the late 1990s, whereas Singapore and Malaysia remained authoritarian throughout the study period. In terms of education provision, Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore are relatively higher education achievers than Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand.Google Scholar

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23. A more accurate measure for participation is net school enrollment ratio, which excludes children enrolled at a certain level but above the official school age. However, this measure suffers a serious missing data problem for countries in my sample.Google Scholar

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26. The democratic years in the dataset are Indonesia (1999–2002), South Korea (1988–2002), the Philippines (1987–2002), Thailand (1992–2002), and Taiwan (1992–2002).Google Scholar

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38. The simple Pearson correlation between these two variables is — .9.Google Scholar

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42. Given the methodological limitations on testing stationarity for TSCS data, both the Im-Pesaran-Shin panel unit root test and Dicky-Fuller tests for individual time series in each country are performed. Details of the tests are not shown here due to space limitations.Google Scholar

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45. Objections have been made that including country and decade dummies might absorb cross-section and cross-time variance; thus, scholars need to be careful about using them by balancing their advantages and disadvantages. Plumper, Thomas, Troeger, Vera E., and Manow, Philip, “Panel Data Analysis in Comparative Politics: Linking Method to Theory,” European Journal of Political Research 44 (March 2005): 327–354; Beck, and Katz, , “Time Series–Cross Section Issues.” In response to these concerns, an F-test has been conducted in the study to assess whether country effects are required; some countries have also been added or dropped from the model one at a time to see whether the results would differ. In terms of using the decade dummy of the 1990s, given that my data (eight countries, thirty-three years each) are dominant in the time dimension, I am less worried that one decade dummy would badly absorb the variation.Google Scholar

46. Since I do not theoretically expect a long-run impact of election cycle on education spending, I have only included a differencing term for it.Google Scholar

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48. For a detailed derivation of the error correction model and the interpretation of the coefficients, see Appendix 2.Google Scholar

49. For formulas to interpret the coefficients, see Appendix 2.Google Scholar

50. Data for disaggregated spending are available only for the period 1971–1997, while data for aggregate spending covers 1971 to 2003. What compounds less data availability for disaggregated spending models is the problem of missing data in countries such as Indonesia.Google Scholar

51. The four measures are (1) another dichotomous measure of democracy that highlights its contestation and participation nature (Alvarez, Mike, Cheibub, José Antonio, Limongi, Fernando, and Przeworski, Adam, “Classifying Political Regimes,” Studies in Comparative International Development 31 [Summer 1996]: 3–36); (2) a continuous measure of the Polity score, (3) the liberty score published by Freedom House focusing on a list of political and civil rights that citizens should enjoy in a democracy (Gastil, Raymond Duncan, “The Comparative Survey of Freedom: Experiences and Suggestions,” Studies in Comparative International Development 25 [Spring 1990]: 25–50); and (4) a democracy score (polyarchy) constructed by Vanhanen, Tatu, “A New Dataset for Measuring Democracy, 1810–1998,” Journal of Peace Research 37, no. 2 (2000): 251–265, relying mainly on election results.Google Scholar

52. The positive impacts of democracy on secondary school enrollment are no longer significant when I use indicators that do not emphasize the institutional constraint dimension of democracy (Freedom House liberty score and Vanhanen's polyarchy index; see note 51).Google Scholar

53. For example, the explanatory variables already in the model (except capital stock as percent of GDP) can explain 35 percent of total government spending.Google Scholar

54. Two studies have identified different effects of democracy on education achievement for rich and poor countries: Brown, , “Reading, Writing, and Regime Type”; and Baum, and Lake, , “Political Economy of Growth.” Google Scholar

55. Urbanization is included in the school enrollment models due to its high explanatory power.Google Scholar

56. Taiwan does not have data on capital account openness; Hong Kong lacks data on capital stock, polity score, and election.Google Scholar

57. I was able to include Taiwan in the estimation sample by dropping the explanatory variable of capital account openness; similarly, by dropping capital account openness, capital stock, election, and the changing of democracy specification from polity scores to Freedom House liberty scores, I was able to include both Taiwan and Hong Kong in the estimation sample.Google Scholar

58. Another advantage of case study is to help identify the underlying causal process, which is beyond the scope of this article.Google Scholar

59. Among other democratizing cases in the sample, South Korea, which democratized in the late 1980s and has a relatively high income, is well represented by Taiwan. The Philippines, with lower income and democratization in the late 1980s, is well represented by Thailand. Indonesia, which democratized in the late 1990s, is a less ideal candidate to study the effects of democratization, which may take some time to realize.Google Scholar

60. Three kinds of proelite spending inequalities have been identified by the Taiwanese education movement organizations: (1) the government devoted more resources to university education than to compulsory education; (2) investment in academic education was favored by the government over vocational education; (3) private education received few subsidies from the government compared with public education. Given the strict government control of enrollment in public universities and senior high academic schools, it is students coming from rich families that are more likely to go to the better-funded academic schools, public schools, and universities, as they can better afford extra exam tutoring and fees and have less need to make money. Xue, Xiaohua, Civil Education Reform Movement in Taiwan (in Chinese) (Taipei: Qianwei Publishing, 1996).Google Scholar

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63. Article 164 of the Taiwanese constitution stipulated that “expenditures of educational programs, scientific studies and cultural service shall be, in respect of the central government, no less than 15 percent of the total national budget; in respect of each province, no less than 25 percent of the total provincial budget; and in respect of each municipality or hsien, no less than 35 percent of the total municipal or hsien budget.” Google Scholar

64. Some authors argue that this is because the central government devoted most resources to defense spending. Zhu, Jingyi and Ye, Jiahui, “Private Education in Taiwan: Examination of Current Status and Policy Recommendations” (in Chinese), paper presented at the National Civil Education Reform Conference, January 8, 1994.Google Scholar

65. Due to the limitation of my research, I have no information on the names of these legislators or the bills they proposed.Google Scholar

66. Article 164 was abolished upon recommendation by officials in the executive branch, such as the Ministry of Finance and the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting, and Statistics, and the Executive Yuan, for reasons of inefficiency and waste. Chen, Lizhu, “The Crisis and Turning Point of Education Finance in Taiwan” (in Chinese), proceedings of the Taiwan Education Fundamental Act Conference, 2000); Huang, Shixin and Ding, Zhiquan, “A Study on Education Revenues and Expenditures: Reasons for Freezing Article 164 of the Constitution and Responses” (in Chinese), Taiwan: Ministry of Education, June 1999.Google Scholar

67. Another reason for the decreasing ratio is the smaller youth population at the primary and the secondary levels.Google Scholar

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72. In the mid-1980s, of the students who passed the university entrance exams, 46 percent were Bangkok residents and 74 percent were children of proprietors or government officials. Furthermore, the subsidies provided by the government for the tertiary level far outweigh those provided for the primary and secondary levels. Kuhonta, Erik M., “The Political Economy of Equitable Development in Thailand,” American Asian Review 21 (Winter 2003): 69–108.Google Scholar

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