State history, historical legitimacy and modern ethnic diversity

Bleaney, Michael; Dimico, Arcangelo

doi:10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2016.03.001

Cited by 7 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…However, other studies have cast doubt on the negative effect of ethnic diversity on public good provision and fiscal capacity development. For instance, some accounts argue that ethnic divisions are endogenous to processes of state building, as both ethnic divisions and low fiscal capacity may be legacies of weakly developed state capacity inherited from the past (Bleaney & Dimico, 2016; Wimmer, 2016). Similarly, recent contributions have highlighted that ethnic divisions and class cleavages often overlap, making it difficult to identify the causal effect of ethnic diversity (Baldwin & Huber, 2010; Kustov & Pardelli, 2018).…”

Section: Ethnic Minorities and State Buildingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, other research suggests that interstate war has a positive effect on fiscal capacity only in presence of a comparatively homogeneous population (Centeno, 2002; Taylor & Botea, 2008). Finally, ethnic divisions and fiscal capacity are both influenced by earlier political processes, including histories of war (Besley & Persson, 2009; Bleaney & Dimico, 2016; Gennaioli & Voth, 2015; Wimmer, 2016), which suggests that the relationship between minority-majority divisions, interstate war, and fiscal capacity development is at least partly endogenous.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Ethnic Minorities, Interstate War, and Popular Support for Fiscal Capacity Development

Walter

Emmenegger

2022

Comparative Political Studies

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Do ethnic majorities and minorities have diverging preferences for fiscal capacity? Do these preferences converge during national emergencies such as interstate war? In this paper, we provide evidence from a natural experiment to demonstrate that politically salient minority-majority divisions undermine the development of fiscal capacity. In addition, we show that the pressure of interstate war is insufficient to supersede differences in support for the expansion of state’s capacity for taxation between majority and minority groups. More specifically, we employ a regression discontinuity design using a natural border that separates linguistic groups and municipality outcomes of a popular vote on the introduction of direct taxation at federal level in Switzerland during the First World War. The findings suggest that salient minority-majority divisions have a negative effect on the expansion of states’ capacity for taxation even during periods of interstate war.

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Section: Ethnic Minorities and State Buildingmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Ethnic Minorities, Interstate War, and Popular Support for Fiscal Capacity Development

Walter

Emmenegger

2022

Comparative Political Studies

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“…As regards the former, research shows that ethnic diversity can be explained as a result of tropical geography, state history, genetic diversity, land diversity, modern state strength and colonial rule (Ahlerup and Olsson, 2012;Ashraf and Galor, 2013;Bleaney and Dimico, 2016;Green, 2013;Michalopoulos, 2012;Wimmer, 2015). This literature helps to explain why Uganda is so ethnically diverse, with its proximity to the equator, a history of slavery, and short state history.…”

Section: Group and Individual Demands For Regionalismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Taking it Personally: the Effect of Ethnic Attachment on Preferences for Regionalism

Ricart-Huguet

Green

2017

St Comp Int Dev

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This paper presents three related findings on regional decentralization. We use an original dataset collected in Uganda to establish, for the first time in a developing country context, that individuals have meaningful preferences over the degree of regional decentralization they desire, ranging from centralism to secessionism. Second, multilevel models suggest that a small share of this variation is explained at the district and ethnic group levels. The preference for regional decentralization monotonically increases with an ethnic group or district's average ethnic attachment. However, the relationship with an ethnic group or district's income is U-shaped: both the richest and the poorest groups desire more regionalism, reconciling interest and identity-based explanations for regionalism. Finally, we show that higher individual ethnic attachment increases preferences for regionalism using fixed effects and a new matching method. Abstract This paper presents three related findings on regional decentralization. We use an original dataset collected in Uganda to establish, for the first time in a developing country context, that individuals have meaningful preferences over the degree of regional decentralization they desire, ranging from centralism to secessionism. Second, multilevel models suggest that a small share of this variation is explained at the district and ethnic group levels. The preference for regional decentralization monotonically increases with an ethnic group or district's average ethnic attachment. However, the relationship with an ethnic group or district's income is U-shaped: both the richest and the poorest groups desire more regionalism, reconciling interest and identity-based explanations for regionalism. Finally, we show that higher individual ethnic attachment increases preferences for regionalism using fixed effects and a new matching method.

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“…Scholars from political science, sociology, and economics have all contributed to our collective understanding of ethnicity within recent years, including notable research into how and why ethnic diversity undermines cooperation (Habyarimana et al 2009), the interaction between ethnic identity and party politics (Posner 2005), and how ethnicity affects conflict (Cederman and Girardin 2007;Esteban and Ray 2008;Wimmer et al 2009), among other topics. There has also been an attempt to explain variation in ethnic diversity across the world, with suggestion that ethnic diversity can be explained as a result of state history, genetic diversity, land diversity, modern state strength and colonial rule (Ahlerup and Olsson 2012;Ashraf and Galor 2013;Bleaney and Dimico 2016;Michalopoulos 2012;Wimmer 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Industrialization and ethnic change in the modern world

Green

2017

Ethnic and Racial Studies

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Despite the large recent attention given to ethnicity within the social sciences, the sources of modern ethnic change have remained opaque. Drawing upon social theory from Marx and Gellner, I argue here that industrialization incentivizes ethnic homogenization by lowering the relative value of land. Using carbon emissions per capita as a proxy for industrialization, I show that crosscountry changes in ethno-linguistic fractionalization between 1961 and 1985 are negatively correlated with industrialization, and that this result is robust to the use of a variety of control variables, sub-samples and alternative measures of industrialization such as cement production, urbanization and agriculture as a percentage of GDP. In particular I find no evidence for the direct role of the state in promoting ethnic homogenization, which adds to other recent evidence on how economic incentives may trump political ones as regards identity change, at least in the short-to medium term.

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State history, historical legitimacy and modern ethnic diversity

Cited by 7 publications

References 42 publications

Ethnic Minorities, Interstate War, and Popular Support for Fiscal Capacity Development

Ethnic Minorities, Interstate War, and Popular Support for Fiscal Capacity Development

Taking it Personally: the Effect of Ethnic Attachment on Preferences for Regionalism

Industrialization and ethnic change in the modern world

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