IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/rsocec/v65y2007i2p141-164.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Balkanization and assimilation: Examining the effects of state-created homogeneity

Author

Listed:
  • Peter T. Leeson

Abstract

This paper investigates the effects of state-created homogeneity on the ability of socially distant individuals to trade. I show that where the state is absent, socially distant agents adopt the customs, practices and institutions of outsiders they desire to interact with. By creating a degree of homogeneity, agents signal their credibility to each other. These signals, in turn, enable inter-group exchange. Formal institutions provided by government can create noise in these signals. This noise incapacitates the information mechanism employed by heterogeneous agents to enable trade.

Suggested Citation

  • Peter T. Leeson, 2007. "Balkanization and assimilation: Examining the effects of state-created homogeneity," Review of Social Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 65(2), pages 141-164.
  • Handle: RePEc:taf:rsocec:v:65:y:2007:i:2:p:141-164
    DOI: 10.1080/00346760600709960
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00346760600709960
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/00346760600709960?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Leeson, Peter T., 2005. "Endogenizing fractionalization," Journal of Institutional Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 75-98, June.
    2. Alberto Alesina & Eliana La Ferrara, 2000. "Participation in Heterogeneous Communities," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(3), pages 847-904.
    3. Curtin,Philip D., 1984. "Cross-Cultural Trade in World History," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521269315, January.
    4. Abreu, Dilip & Pearce, David & Stacchetti, Ennio, 1990. "Toward a Theory of Discounted Repeated Games with Imperfect Monitoring," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 58(5), pages 1041-1063, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Peter T. Leeson & Claudia R. Williamson, 2011. "Can’t We All Just Get Along? Fractionalization, Institutions and Economic Consequences," Chapters, in: Christopher J. Coyne & Rachel L. Mathers (ed.), The Handbook on the Political Economy of War, chapter 4, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Pavel Chalupnicek, 2010. "The CAPITAL in Social Capital: An Austrian Perspective," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 69(4), pages 1230-1250, October.
    3. Daniel Smith, 2014. "Heterogeneity and exchange: Safe-conducts in Medieval Spain," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 27(2), pages 183-197, June.
    4. Trent J. MacDonald, 2019. "The Political Economy of Non-Territorial Exit," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 18871.
    5. Arne Schollaert & Dirk Van de gaer, 2008. "Boycotts, Power Politics, or Trust Building: How to Prevent Conflict?," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 164(2), pages 356-379, June.
    6. Anthony Carilli & Christopher Coyne & Peter Leeson, 2008. "Government intervention and the structure of social capital," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 21(2), pages 209-218, September.
    7. ., 2019. "Economic theory of non-territorial unbundling," Chapters, in: The Political Economy of Non-Territorial Exit, chapter 1, pages 14-38, Edward Elgar Publishing.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gerring, John & Thacker, Strom C. & Lu, Yuan & Huang, Wei, 2015. "Does Diversity Impair Human Development? A Multi-Level Test of the Diversity Debit Hypothesis," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 166-188.
    2. Oguzhan C Dincer & Michael J Hotard, 2011. "Ethnic and Religious Diversity and Income Inequality," Eastern Economic Journal, Palgrave Macmillan;Eastern Economic Association, vol. 37(3), pages 417-430.
    3. Peter T. Leeson, 2008. "Social Distance and Self-Enforcing Exchange," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 37(1), pages 161-188, January.
    4. Coyne,Christopher J., 2020. "Defense, Peace, and War Economics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781108724036, January.
    5. Meghamrita Chakraborty, 2023. "Linking Migration, Diversity and Regional Development in India," Journal of Development Policy and Practice, , vol. 8(1), pages 55-72, January.
    6. Klaus Desmet & Ignacio Ortuño-Ortín & Romain Wacziarg, 2009. "The political economy of ethnolinguistic cleavages," Working Papers 2009-17, Instituto Madrileño de Estudios Avanzados (IMDEA) Ciencias Sociales.
    7. Roberta Dessì & Salvatore Piccolo, 2008. "Two is Company, N is a Crowd? Merchant Guilds and Social Capital," CSEF Working Papers 202, Centre for Studies in Economics and Finance (CSEF), University of Naples, Italy, revised 12 Jul 2009.
    8. Hilber, Christian A.L., 2010. "New housing supply and the dilution of social capital," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(3), pages 419-437, May.
    9. Andreas Löschel & Dirk Rübbelke, 2014. "On the Voluntary Provision of International Public Goods," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 81(322), pages 195-204, April.
    10. Kahsay, Goytom Abraha & Medhin, Haileselassie, 2020. "Leader turnover and forest management outcomes: Micro-level evidence from Ethiopia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    11. Tobias Laun, 2020. "Optimal Social Insurance with Endogenous Health," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 122(2), pages 464-493, April.
    12. Ely, Jeffrey C. & Valimaki, Juuso, 2002. "A Robust Folk Theorem for the Prisoner's Dilemma," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 102(1), pages 84-105, January.
    13. Espino, Emilio, 2005. "On Ramsey's conjecture: efficient allocations in the neoclassical growth model with private information," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 121(2), pages 192-213, April.
    14. Francesco Caselli & Wilbur John Coleman II, 2013. "On The Theory Of Ethnic Conflict," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 11, pages 161-192, January.
    15. Lars Kunze & Nicolai Suppa, 2014. "Bowling Alone or Bowling at All? The Effect of Unemployment on Social Participation," Ruhr Economic Papers 0510, Rheinisch-Westfälisches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universität Dortmund, Universität Duisburg-Essen.
    16. Wang, Cheng, 2011. "Termination of dynamic contracts in an equilibrium labor market model," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 146(1), pages 74-110, January.
    17. Miao, Jianjun & Zhang, Yuzhe, 2015. "A duality approach to continuous-time contracting problems with limited commitment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 159(PB), pages 929-988.
    18. Yann Algan & Camille Hémet & David D. Laitin, 2016. "The Social Effects of Ethnic Diversity at the Local Level: A Natural Experiment with Exogenous Residential Allocation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 124(3), pages 696-733.
    19. Chen, Yangyang & Duong, Huu Nhan & Goyal, Abhinav & Veeraraghavan, Madhu, 2023. "Social capital and the pricing of initial public offerings," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    20. Robert Holton, 2000. "Globalization's Cultural Consequences," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 570(1), pages 140-152, July.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:rsocec:v:65:y:2007:i:2:p:141-164. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/RRSE20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.