Bovens and Wille argue that the Netherlands has become a diploma democracy in which the higher educated dominate all venues of political participation and thus shape policy in their favor. Bovens and Wille see disparities between the political priorities and preferences of the higher and lower educated and argue that the lower levels of participation of the less educated lead to their underrepresentation and subsequent disaffection. In this reply, it is argued that the empirical analysis that supports Bovens and Wille's thesis does not warrant such a conclusion. A replication of Bovens and Wille's analysis shows that the gap between higher and lower educated is non-existent and that the differences in political behavior cannot simply be attributed to education.
