Student Attitudes Toward Deregulation, Barriers to Entry, and Market Self-Regulation at Gulu University, 2026: Baseline Distributions and Short-Term Change After an Educational Event

This study examines the baseline distributions and the short-term changes in responses to four statements concerning deregulation, barriers to entry, and market self-regulation. The statements were administered before and after the Entrepreneurship and Leadership Conference held at Gulu University in September 2026 as part of the African Forum for Development and Innovation multi-university longitudinal survey. One hundred and two participants completed both waves of the anonymous voluntary questionnaire. Prior to the conference, 69.6 percent of respondents agreed that reducing government regulations benefits economic growth and innovation, 56.9 percent agreed that regulations protect the public, 78.4 percent agreed that markets function better with fewer barriers to entry and competition, and 46.1 percent agreed that markets function better when they can largely self-regulate. After the conference the corresponding percentages of Yes responses were 83.3 percent, 63.7 percent, 77.5 percent, and 62.7 percent. The largest gains appeared on the statements concerning the benefits of reduced regulation (+13.7 percentage points) and the capacity of markets to self-regulate (+16.6 percentage points). These results indicate that participants already held moderately favorable views of market mechanisms and that the event was associated with further movement toward those views, particularly on the questions of regulatory reduction and self-regulation. The findings constitute the first university-level case in a planned multi-year series that will apply the same four statements at additional institutions.