Can Education Reduce Violent Crime? Evidence from Mexico before and after the Drug War Onset

Abstract

Existing theories relate higher education to lower crime rates, yet we have limited evidence on the crime-reducing effect of education in developing countries. We contribute to this literature by examining the effect of education on homicide in Mexico, where homicide rates decreased by nearly 55 percent from 1992 to 2007, before the surge of drug-related violence. We argue that a large amount of this reduction followed a compulsory schooling law at the secondary level in 1993, when the government undertook key education reforms to promote development and economic integration. We employ different empirical strategies that combine regression analysis, placebo tests, and an instrumental variable approach, and find that attendance in secondary and tertiary schools has a negative effect on homicide rates before the onset of the Drug War, although the evidence for secondary enrolment is more robust. This effect vanishes after the drug war onset, indicating that school attendance has different effects on different types of criminal activity. These findings suggest that policy makers can reduce crime and traditional forms of interpersonal violence by strengthening the education system.

Educational big data mining: Mediation of academic performance in crime among digital age young adults

“…Furthermore, if one had undertaken a good quality intensive early childhood education program, the likelihood of committing a crime is reduced (Garcia et al, 2019). Another study in Mexico found that homicide rates had decreased by 55.0% from 1992 to 2007 with increased attendance in secondary and tertiary schools after a compulsory schooling law in the country (Gleditsch et al, 2022). Furthermore, education increases and widens the employment opportunities of a person.…”

“…Extensive literature is available on the direct negative correlation between academic performance and crime at various levels of education such as preschool (García et al, 2019), secondary school (Eren et al, 2022;Huttunen et al, 2023), tertiary school (Gleditsch et al, 2022), and in general (Ahmed et al, 2019). Furthermore, Online Journal of Communication and Media Technologies, 2024 Online Journal of Communication and Media Technologies, 14(1), e202403…”

The Criminon Model: A New paradigm for Offender Rehabilitation in Pakistan

“…There is abundant evidence that points to a connection between illiteracy and criminal behavior (Rivera et al, 2022). The inability to succeed academically or educationally can immediately lead to criminal activity and violent behavior.…”

Behavioral Activation System and Early Life Parental Abuse Are Associated with Antisocial Behaviors in Mexican Adolescents

“…Conflicts related to the drug trade have had an increased spillover of violence onto civilian non-actors [6], and some of the current highest homicide rates are in northwestern Mexico, where this research was carried out [7]. Despite these high rates, it is well known that increased educational attainment has a bidirectional relationship with crime -those who have a higher education have a lower probability of being involved in crime [8]; however, during the Drug War, this was not the case, and increases in crime have been consistently on the rise ever since. Nevertheless, if abuse, violence, and trauma represent negative factors influencing behavior, then other factors related to approach behaviors such as persistence in the pursuit of achieving personal goals, reinforcement of personal interests, and responsivity to rewarding stimuli may serve as counterbalancing measures in the avoidance of AB.…”