Religious Leaders’ Compliance with State Authority: Experimental Evidence from COVID-19 in Pakistan

Abstract

A randomized controlled trial in Pakistan tests whether one-on-one engagement with community religious leaders can encourage them to instruct congregants to follow government regulations. Treated religious leaders are 25 percent more likely to comply with government requirements to tell congregants they should wear a mask to prevent COVID transmission when attending prayers. Treatment effects do not depend on the religious content of the message. Effects are driven by respondents who already understand the mechanics of COVID transmission at baseline, suggesting the treatment does not work by correcting basic knowledge about the disease, but rather through a mechanism of persuasion.