Public schooling, indoctrination, and totalitarianism

Governments use public education and public ownership of the media to contr ol the information that their citizens receive. More totalitarian governmen ts as well as those with larger wealth transfers make greater investments i n publicly controlled information. This finding is borne out from cross-sec tional time-series evidence across countries and is confirmed when the rece nt fall of communism is specifically examined. My results reject the standa rd public-good view linking education and democracy, and I find evidence th at public educational expenditures vary in similar ways to government owner ship of television stations. Country-level data on the organization of fami lies as well as data on South African public schools are also examined.