Ethnic segregation and the quality of government: the importance of regional diversity

It has recently been argued that the regional segregation of ethnic or linguistic groups leads to lower government quality and that this is partly due to the negative effect of segregation on inter-group trust. In this paper I show that the relationship between ethnic segregation, trust and government quality is mediated by another dimension of regional diversity namely, regional income disparities. Accounting for regional disparities reduces the estimated impact of segregation and trust on the quality of government and reduces the statistical robustness of ethnic segregation. The analysis highlights the usefulness of identifying other factors which may be driving regional diversity, beyond ethno-linguistic characteristics.     

关于经典产权经济研究的综合评述与判断

文章基于经典产权制度的7大模型,对经典产权制度进行了全面的梳理与评述,无论是逐利动机模型、"公地悲剧"模型、交易成本模型、产权界定模型、微观产权模型、比较分析模型还是法经济分析模型,各有优劣,且它们之间并非结论一致。该现状反映了理论的中性与理论的非完美性。文章通过比较分析法,得出的结论是任何产权制度理论在阐释中国问题时都有局限性,故而建议变通使用经典产权制度理论。之所以对经典产权经济的相关研究进行综合评述,目的是为研究中国少数民族产权制度做好铺垫,尤其是现在产权经济研究的走向问题,当它似乎变得不再那么红极一时,它的理论适应性是否可以在中国少数民族推广,是否能够为中国少数民族产权经济发展指引方向。     

族群多样性与地方经济增长—来自中国城市层面的证据

族群多样性的经济影响及其发生机制,是经济学中一个方兴未艾的前沿研究领域.文章利用全国人口普查数据和抽样调查资料,构建了中国300多个城市族群多样性的面板数据,通过计量分析发现,高的族群多样性显著降低了地方经济增长率.在考察了测量指标的影响和内生性问题后,结论依然稳健.通过对影响机制的探讨,文章发现:高的族群多样性显著增大了语言沟通成本,降低了私有部门投资率;另一方面,公有部门投资率不受族群多样性的影响,人均中央财政转移支付和族群多样性显著正相关,这两者缓解了族群多样性的不利影响.以上发现,一方面为族群多样性经济影响的研究提供了新的实证证据;另一方面也为中国地方经济增长的差异性提供了一个新的解释,并衍生出新的学术课题和政策意涵.     

Segregation and Black political efficacy

The impact of segregation on Black political efficacy is theoretically ambiguous. On one hand, increased contact among Blacks in more segregated areas may mean that Blacks are better able to coordinate political behavior. On the other hand, lesser contact with non-Blacks may mean that Blacks have less political influence over voters of other races. As for non-Blacks, inter-group conflict theory suggests that greater contact yields greater conflict between the groups while inter-group contact theory suggests exactly the reverse. We investigate this question empirically. We find that exogenous increases in segregation lead to decreases in Black civic efficacy, as measured by an ability to elect Representatives who vote liberally and more specifically in favor of legislation that is favored by Blacks. This tendency for Representatives from more segregated MSAs to vote more conservatively arises in spite of the fact that Blacks in more segregated areas hold more liberal political views than do Blacks in less segregated locales. We find evidence that this decrease in efficacy is driven by more conservative attitudes amongst non-Blacks in more segregated areas.     

Interethnic relations,informal trading networks,and social integration: imitation,habits, and social evolution

The ethnically homogeneous middleman groups (EHMGs), which are informal trading networks, are ubiquitous in less-developed economies where the legal infrastructure for contract enforcement is not well developed. This paper develops a formal model of social interaction among members of the EHMG as well as in more general situations in a multi-ethnic or multi-cultural society consisting of identifiable ethnic or linguistic groups. Behavioral patterns are transmitted between generations and altered via imitation in social contacts. The model demonstrates how different discriminatory behavioral patterns can evolve and persist over time. One result is that the trust between such groups can increase due to a higher frequency of inter-group contacts. In concluding the paper, we speculate about how the model can be expanded to include changes in legal structures, especially contract law. This could lead to an increase in the trust between the different groups.     

The Law and Bioeconomics of Ethnic Cooperation and Conflict in Plural Societies of Southeast Asia: a Theory of Chinese Merchant Success

Overseas Chinese dominate merchant roles in the economies of Southeast Asia. Chinese merchant success has generated envy and hatred by indigenous populations, resulting in episodes of racial violence toward the Chinese. In order to understand the economic basis of inter-ethnic conflict and violence, it is necessary to understand the economic basis of success of Chinese merchants in Southeast Asia. The paper presents an economic theory of Chinese middleman success. Central to the theory is the idea that the Confucian code of ethics which emphasize the importance of mutual aid/reciprocity among kinsmen, fellow-villagers and those speaking the same dialect, enabled the Chinese to cooperate among members of their own dialect group to form a club-like ethnically homogeneous middleman group (EHMG) for the provision of infrastructure, essential for middleman entrepreneurship. Chinese merchants embedded in the EHMG were able to economize on transaction costs, and this gave them a differential advantage to out-compete other ethnic groups to appropriate merchant roles. The EHMG functions also as a 'cultural transmission unit' transmitting Confucian ethics to future generations of Chinese middlemen, hence maintaining Chinese merchant roles over time. The paper draws on some key concepts in the New Institutional Economics literature as well as modern evolutionary biology.     

Minorities and Democratization

We analyze the process of democratization in a polity with groups that are divided along ethnic as well as economic lines. We show that: (i) the presence of ethnic minorities, in general, makes peaceful democratic transitions less likely; (ii) minorities suffer from discriminatory policies less in democracies with intermediate levels of income inequality; and (iii) in new democracies with low levels of income inequality, politics is divided along ethnic lines, and at greater levels of inequality economic cleavages predominate.     

Early state institutions and the persistence of linguistic diversity

The persistence of diversity is often associated with various negative economic outcomes, and yet the causes of its wide disparity throughout the world are not well understood. This paper hypothesizes the persistence of linguistic diversity (measured as the survival rate of indigenous languages) can be explained by the length of statehood experience. Using data for up to 133 countries, the results suggest that countries which have experienced a long history of pre-colonial statehood tend to have a lower degree of persistence of linguistic diversity today. This finding, therefore, provides some support to the view that a more established state has a greater capacity to reduce inter-group differences, thus contributing to less persistent linguistic diversity within a country.     

Violence and economic activity: evidence from African American patents, 1870–1940

Recent studies have examined the effect of political conflict and domestic terrorism on economic and political outcomes. This paper uses the rise in mass violence between 1870 and 1940 as an historical experiment for determining the impact of ethnic and political violence on economic activity, namely patenting. I find that violent acts account for more than 1,100 missing patents compared to 726 actual patents among African American inventors over this period. Valuable patents decline in response to major riots and segregation laws. Absence of the rule of law covaries with declines in patent productivity for white and black inventors, but this decline is significant only for African American inventors. Patenting responds positively to declines in violence. These findings imply that ethnic and political conflict may affect the level, direction, and quality of invention and economic growth over time.     

长三角港口物流经济空间差异及演化分析

以长三角14个集装箱港口为基本研究单元,选用塞尔指数对该区域近18年的港口物流经济发展进行了定量测度.结果表明:①区域港口物流经济发展整体差异不断扩大,但表现出一定的波动性,其中1990-1993年、1999-2001年及2004-2007年三个时段的发展差异逐步缩小;②基于不同分组的组内、组间发展差异明显,但组间差异一直是导致港口物流经济发展总差异演变的重要原因;③交通区位优化、相关产业及发展政策、信息与人力资源状况以及航运网络优化等是导致上述动态特征的成因机制.     

Does ethnic diversity decrease economic interactions? Evidence from exchange networks in rural Gambia

Using a unique dataset collected in 59 rural Gambian villages, we study how ethnic heterogeneity is related to the structure of four economic exchange networks: land, labour, inputs and credit. We find that different measures of village‐level ethnic fragmentation are mostly uncorrelated with network structure. At a more disaggregated level, household heads belonging to ethnic minorities are not less central than those from the predominant ethnicity in any of the networks and, at the dyadic level, the fact that two households share ethnicity is not an economically significant predictor of link formation. Our results indicate that, in the particular setting of our study, the structure of the exchange networks is better defined by other variables than ethnicity and that ethnic heterogeneity is unlikely to be a driver for sub‐optimal economic exchanges.     

Ethnic Networks in FDI and the Impact of Institutional Development

Ethnic Chinese entrepreneurs are known for their active business networking practices, particularly in Southeast Asia. This paper empirically investigates the role of ethnic Chinese networks in promoting foreign direct investment (FDI). We further evaluate whether the effectiveness of networking activities are affected by the level of economic and institutional development of the source and the host countries. Using a standard gravity model, we find that ethnic Chinese networks are significant in facilitating cross‐border investment between countries. The strength of ethnic Chinese networks between country pairs, approximated by the product of the numbers of ethnic Chinese in both countries, is positively correlated with the cumulative amount of their reciprocal FDI. More importantly, this significant relationship is not limited to countries in Southeast Asia, but is applicable to other country pairs included in the study as well, regardless of whether the investment is originated from industrial countries or developing economies. Finally, the analysis finds no evidence that ethnic networks are only effective in countries where economic and legal institutions are under‐developed. Ethnic Chinese networks have played a significant role in promoting FDI to countries with a relatively higher bureaucratic quality, much more so than to countries with a lower bureaucratic quality.     

对加快发展少数民族经济重要性的认识

加快发展少数民族经济是党和国家的一项重要政策,中国少数民族地区经济文化发展相对落后。少数民族经济在中国国民经济中占有重要地位,少数民族地区在国防建设中具有重要的战略地位等原因,体现了加快发展少数民族经济的重要性。另外,加快发展少数民族经济还具有重要而深远的意义。     

Ethnicity, Politics and Economic Performance

The paper investigates the effects of ethnic diversity on economic performance. Previous studies have found that diversity has various detrimental microeconomic effects, tending to reduce public sector performance, and has large detrimental effects on the overall growth rate. I develop a simple model of the effect of ethnic diversity on a government decision problem in which there is a tradeoff between growth and distribution, in the contexts of democracy and dictatorship. I find that in democracy ethnic diversity has no effect upon the decision, whereas in dictatorship ethnic diversity leads to a government choice which reduces the growth rate. I then test these propositions on two data sets. The first is for 94 countries over the period 1960–1990. I find that whether diversity adversely affects overall economic growth depends upon the political environment. Diversity is highly damaging to growth in the context of limited political rights, but is not damaging in democracies. The second is for World Bank projects in 89 countries. I find that the same relationship between diversity and democracy affects the proportion of projects which are successful.     

Explaining ethnic unemployment and activity rates: evidence from the QLFS in the 1990s and 2000s

This article uses data from the Quarterly Labour Force Survey for 1992–95 and 2000–03 to examine changes in ethnic unemployment and economic activity. The intention was to compare the relatively high unemployment era of the 1990s with the lower unemployment era of the 2000s. Although the ethnic minority unemployment situation has improved, only half of the difference between white and non‐white unemployment can be attributed to differences in observed characteristics. This suggests that a large unexplained discriminatory element still exists for most ethnic minorities. This has become larger for Pakistani/Bangladeshi men, implying a widening of the unexplained ethnic differential.     

以科学发展观为指导促进贵州民族地区经济可持续发展

贵州民族地区经济发展是全省经济发展的重要组成部分。但长期以来,多数民族地区偏重于依靠第二产业尤其是工业增长实现经济跨越式发展的模式。转变民族地区经济发展方式,坚持可持续的发展方向,是民族地区贯彻落实科学发展观的客观需要,是促进民族地区经济又好又快发展的有效途径。     

Teaching in the right context: Textbook supply program,language, and learning

An ethnic gap in education is prevalent around the world. This remains the case in Vietnam, a country that has achieved phenomenal economic growth and raised the educational attainment of the public. This paper examines the impact of language policy reorientation represented by the textbook supply program in Vietnam on the ethnic gap in children's learning measured by a vocabulary test. Applying difference-in-differences estimation to the Young Lives data between 2006 and 2015, we show that the program became more effective in narrowing the ethnic gap as the education policy became reoriented toward ethnic minority children. A causal mediation analysis reveals that increased study time is possibly a moderate mediator through which the language policy reorientation helped narrow the ethnic gap for the young cohort over and above the direct impact, but this was not the case for the old cohort. This paper, therefore, alludes to the importance of delivering learning materials carefully designed for the target group to bring about meaningful behavioral changes. It also underscores the importance of teaching in the right context, corroborating the findings from recent studies on teaching at the right level.     

创意产业与西部民族地区经济发展

创意产业以创意为核心增长要素,是资源消耗低、污染排放少、附加值高并具有可持续发展特性的产业形态。创意产业的可持续发展特性契合西部民族地区经济发展,是西部民族地区经济发展的引擎。与传统产业耦合是发展西部民族地区创意产业的主要途径。     

The influence of capital controls on long run growth: Where and how much?

The financial crisis in East Asia generated a revival of interest in the merits of financial openness. The ensuing debate on the benefits of openness has focused more on short and medium run issues than on the long run effects. Within the empirical literature on economic growth, little or no attention has been paid to the effects of financial openness. Contrary to the orthodox position, the few results that exist suggest that capital controls have no effect on economic growth. This paper argues that this conclusion emerges from a failure to account for underlying differences across countries with similar degrees of capital controls. We show that the degree of ethnic and linguistic heterogeneity in a country plays a significant role in explaining the effects of controls on economic growth. For countries with relatively higher degrees of ethnic heterogeneity, the effects are particularly adverse whereas for countries with high degrees of homogeneity, capital controls actually have a net positive effect on economic growth. On balance, more developing countries suffered due to controls than not. Within the sample of 57 non-OECD countries that did implement controls for the period 1975–1995, as many as 39 saw a reduction in their growth rates. This result is robust to a number of variables commonly used in the economic growth regressions.