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This study investigates whether increasing the availability of education for women would minimize gender gaps in educational attainment and political knowledge in Taiwan. Seven waves of nationally representative survey data were analyzed to assess the effects of the national education expansion on gender equity in educational attainment and political knowledge. The empirical analysis in this study indicated that the extension of compulsory education and expansion of higher education in Taiwan offered more educational opportunities for women, especially those in the older cohorts, and substantially corrected the educational inequality between genders in the younger cohorts. Furthermore, the improvement in educational equality between genders diminished the gap in political knowledge among younger people in Taiwan.

Literature about the consolidation of democratization in Taiwan began to appear in conferences and journals a decade after Taiwan launched its political reform in late 1980s. While national elections are regularly and peacefully held, few people doubt that Taiwan will become a genuine and mature democracy — as for the extent of maturity, only time will tell. However, a variety of political events in the last decade tempered the people’s confidence in the future of democratic development in Taiwan. Not far away from the joy of the first peaceful alternation of power in 2000, the campaign process for the 2004 presidential election and subsequent events in Taipei aroused the voters’ doubt on the legitimacy of the result of the election. Soon, the scandals of President Chen Shui-bian and his family members astonished not only his supporters but also the public that the people called democracy in question. Although the second successful party alternation in 2008 indicated that Taiwan passed the two-turnover test and became a consolidated democracy (Huntington 1991: 266–267), President Ma Ying-jeou’s approval rating repeatedly hit all-time low in his