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on Cultural Economics |
| By: | Jung, Hanjoon Michael |
| Abstract: | We model media manipulation in which a sender or senders manipulate information through the media to influence receivers. We show that if there is only one sender who has a conditional preference for maintaining its credibility in reporting accurate information and if the receivers face a coordination situation without information about their opponents' types, the sender could influence the receivers to make decisions according to the sender's primary preference by manipulating the information through the media, which makes the report common knowledge. This is true even when the sender and the receivers have contradictory primary preferences. This result extends to the cases in which the sender has imperfect information or in which the sender's primary preference is to maintain its credibility. In the case of multiple senders, however, when there is enough media competition or when simultaneous reporting takes place, the receivers could play their favored outcome against senders' preferences, which sheds light on a solution to the media manipulation problem. |
| Keywords: | Arms Race; Common Knowledge; Information Transmission; Media Bias; Media Competition; Media Manipulation. |
| JEL: | D83 D82 C72 |
| Date: | 2007–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:5473&r=cul |
| By: | Joana Naritomi; Rodrigo R. Soares; Juliano J. Assunção |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes the roots of variation in de facto institutions, within a constant de jure institutional setting. We explore the role of rent-seeking episodes in colonial Brazil as determinants of the quality of current local institutions, and argue that this variation reveals a de facto dimension of institutional quality. We show that municipalities with origins tracing back to the sugar-cane colonial cycle -- characterized by a polarized and oligarchic socioeconomic structure -- display today more inequality in the distribution of land. Municipalities with origins tracing back to the gold colonial cycle -- characterized by an over-bureaucratic and heavily intervening presence of the Portuguese state -- display today worse governance practices and less access to justice. The colonial rent-seeking episodes are also correlated with lower provision of public goods and lower income per capita today, and the latter correlation seems to work partly through worse institutional quality at the local level. |
| JEL: | N26 O17 O40 P14 P28 |
| Date: | 2007–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13545&r=cul |