Unveiled: the Effect of the Headscarf Ban on Women’s Tertiary Education in Turkey

The majority of women in Turkey wear headscarves. However, from 1997 to 2013, headscarves were banned in tertiary education institutions, due to the Turkish military’s decision that headscarves are incompatible with secularism. This study examines the impact of wearing headscarves on women’s educational attainment. In particular, it measures the impact of the headscarf ban by using a regression–discontinuity method, based on individual-level data from four countrywide surveys. Within the confines of the econometric analysis and data set used, the author finds statistically significantly lower tertiary educational attainment among headscarved women, but finds no evidence that the ban reduced the tertiary educational attainment of headscarved women. This result may reflect that, since only 3.5 percent of headscarved women born before the ban had some tertiary education, there was not much room for the methodological approach to capture any significant effects of the ban.HIGHLIGHTS - There exists a large gap in the educational attainment of headscarved women compared to that of non-headscarved women in Turkey, even after controlling for background variables.- This paper finds no evidence that the ban on headscarves at tertiary educational institutions, in effect from 1997 to 2013, reduced the tertiary educational attainment of headscarved women, which was already low.- Educational disadvantage for headscarved women begins after primary school.- Although lifting the headscarf ban was a good first step, eliminating the barriers to women’s education will require a much broader perspective.