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on Cultural Economics |
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Issue of 2015‒03‒05
four papers chosen by Roberto Zanola Università degli Studi del Piemonte Orientale “Amedeo Avogadro” |
| By: | Borowiecki, Karol Jan (Department of Business and Economics) |
| Abstract: | I investigate the consequences of long-run persistency of a society’s preferences for cultural goods. Historical cultural activity is approximated with the frequency of births of music composers during the Renaissance and is linked with contemporary measures of cultural activity in Italian provinces. Areas with a one percent higher number of composer births nowadays show an up to 0.29% higher supply of classical concerts and 0.16% more opera performances. Classical concerts and opera performances have also rather bigger audiences and obtain greater revenues in provinces that have been culturally active in the past. Today, those provinces also exhibit a somewhat lower supply of other forms of entertainment (e.g., sport events), thereby implying a tantalising divergence in societies’ cultural preferences which is attributable to events rooted in the past. It is also shown that the geography of composer births is remarkably persistent over a period of seven centuries. |
| Keywords: | Economic development; Culture; Institutions; Path dependence; Endogenous preferences |
| JEL: | N33 N34 O10 Z10 |
| Date: | 2015–02–25 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:sdueko:2015_003&r=cul |
| By: | Blankespoor, Elizabeth (Stanford University); deHaan, Ed (Stanford University) |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ecl:stabus:3038&r=cul |
| By: | Desmet, Klaus; Ortuño-Ortín, Ignacio; Wacziarg, Romain |
| Abstract: | We investigate the empirical relationship between ethnicity and culture, defined as a vector of traits reflecting norms, attitudes and preferences. Using surveys of individual values in 76 countries, we find that ethnic identity is a significant predictor of cultural values, yet that within-group variation in culture trumps between-group variation. Thus, in contrast to a commonly held view, ethnic and cultural diversity are unrelated. We explore the correlates of cultural diversity and of the overlap between culture and ethnicity, finding that the level of economic development is positively associated with cultural diversity and negatively associated with the overlap between culture and ethnicity. Finally, although only a small portion of a country's overall cultural heterogeneity occurs between groups, this does not imply that cultural differences between groups are irrelevant. Indeed, we find that civil conflict becomes more likely when there is greater overlap between ethnicity and culture. |
| Keywords: | between-group diversity; civil conflict; cultural fractionalization; cultural traits; culture; ethnicity; heterogeneity; identity; social norms; within-group diversity |
| JEL: | D74 J15 P48 Z10 |
| Date: | 2015–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:10451&r=cul |
| By: | Klaus Desmet; Ignacio Ortuño-Ortín; Romain Wacziarg |
| Abstract: | We investigate the empirical relationship between ethnicity and culture, defined as a vector of traits reflecting norms, attitudes and preferences. Using surveys of individual values in 76 countries, we find that ethnic identity is a significant predictor of cultural values, yet that within-group variation in culture trumps between-group variation. Thus, in contrast to a commonly held view, ethnic and cultural diversity are unrelated. We explore the correlates of cultural diversity and of the overlap between culture and ethnicity, finding that the level of economic development is positively associated with cultural diversity and negatively associated with the overlap between culture and ethnicity. Finally, although only a small portion of a country's overall cultural heterogeneity occurs between groups, this does not imply that cultural differences between groups are irrelevant. Indeed, we find that civil conflict becomes more likely when there is greater overlap between ethnicity and culture. |
| JEL: | D74 J15 P48 Z10 |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:20989&r=cul |