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The agrarian origins of social capital

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  • Mariella, Vitantonio

Abstract

This paper investigates the agrarian roots of social capital. I show that Italian areas exhibiting a higher share of temporary agricultural workers in the Post-Unification period register lower civic capital today. Spatial analysis and IV estimates using malaria as a source of exogenous variation indicate that the effect is robust even after controlling for social-property relations being not randomly determined. Finally, I demonstrate that institutions affecting the benefits and costs of cultural norms generate persistent effects. I investigate the role of “industrial districts” as a mechanism to transmit the cultural trait of cooperation through time. Since they developed where temporary workers were relatively rare, I find those municipalities exhibiting high civic capital to have a higher propensity to belong to an industrial district.

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  • Mariella, Vitantonio, 2022. "The agrarian origins of social capital," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 193(C), pages 543-568.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:193:y:2022:i:c:p:543-568
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2021.11.029
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Temporary workers; Social capital; Land tenure; Persistence;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J43 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Agricultural Labor Markets
    • O10 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - General
    • O43 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - Institutions and Growth

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