The legacy of war on social and political behaviour
Michal Bauer, Christopher Blattman, Julie Chytilová, Joseph Henrich, Edward Miguel, Tamar Mitts
VoxEU
Nearly half of all nations in the world have experienced some form of external or internal armed conflict in the past half century. Many international development researchers and policymakers describe war as “development in reverse” (Collier et al. 2003), having persistent adverse effects on all factors relevant for development – physical, human, and social capital. …
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Measuring ethnic preferences: New experimental evidence
Lars Ivar Oppedal Berge, Kjetil Bjorvatn, Simon Galle, Edward Miguel, Daniel N. Posner, Bertil Tungodden, Kelly Zhang
VoxEU
Ethnic divisions have been shown to adversely affect economic performance and political stability, especially in Africa (Easterly and Levine 1997, Cederman et al. 2007 and 2011). The underlying mechanisms that have played a particularly central role in theory, and that are at the root of conventional wisdom about why ethnicity matters, are that individuals exhibit …
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Despite $7 billion to ‘Power Africa’, why the continent is still in the dark
Kenneth Lee, Edward Miguel
Reuters
When President Barack Obama made his first presidential visit to Kenya over the weekend, he visited not just his ancestral home, but one of the target countries in his $7 billion signature foreign aid initiative, Power Africa. Launched in 2013, Power Africa aims to boost electricity access in Sub-Saharan Africa. The initiative has prioritized expanding …
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The scientific case for deworming children
Michael Kremer, Edward Miguel
Thomson Reuters Foundation
The last few days have seen an outpouring of news stories relating to “worm wars”, the policy debate over whether governments should provide mass treatment for intestinal worm infections in endemic areas. This was sparked when a re-analysis of a 2004 study (which found a strong link between deworming and school attendance) was published last …
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Weather and Violence
Marshall Burke, Solomon Hsiang, Edward Miguel
New York Times
As temperatures rise, tempers flare. Anyone who has experienced the hostility of a swelteringly hot summer day in the city can attest to that. But researchers are now quantifying the causal relationship between extreme climate and human conflict. Whether their focus is on small-scale interpersonal aggression or large-scale political instability, low-income or high-income societies, the …
An Open Discussion on Promoting Transparency in Social Science Research
Edward Miguel
BITSS Blog
This CEGA Blog Forum builds on a seminal research meeting held at the University of California, Berkeley on December 7, 2012. The goal was to bring together a select interdisciplinary group of scholars – from biostatistics, economics, political science and psychology – with a shared interest in promoting transparency in empirical social science research. There …
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Africa Unleashed: Explaining the Secret of a Belated Boom
Edward Miguel
Foreign Affairs
It is well known that the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s were a disaster for the countries of sub-Saharan Africa. In a period when other underdeveloped regions, especially Asia, were experiencing steady economic growth, Africa as a whole saw its living standards plummet. Nearly all Africans lived under dictatorships, and millions suffered through brutal civil wars. …
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Development in Dangerous Places: Comment on Collier
Edward Miguel
Boston Review
In his essay (and two recent books) Paul Collier lays out a detailed vision for how foreign aid and intervention might promote economic progress in the world’s poorest regions, areas populated by what he has called the “bottom billion.” The key problem, as Collier describes it here, is that: A group of about 60 small, …
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Politics May Strain Health Care Reform
Edward Miguel
Marketplace
Audio available via Marketplace (18:18). Republican majorities in Congress passed the largest expansion of federal government health spending in decades with the Medicare Prescription Drug Act of 2003, with strong support from President Bush. One has to wonder if there are more than economic ideology differences at work on either side. Even Rush Limbaugh said …
Do Conflicts Cause Poverty, or Vice Versa?
Raymond Fisman, Edward Miguel
VoxEU
Understanding the tangled web of cause and effect that potentially links poverty and violence is a task that has long stymied social scientists. Does war cause poverty, or vice-versa? Or perhaps other factors – such as societal hatreds or divisions – cause both economic stagnation and war. Maybe all three of these are operating at …
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How to Prevent War and Famine
Raymond Fisman, Edward Miguel
Forbes
With the U.S. financial system in unprecedented turmoil and the economy moving toward recession, ordinary Americans wake up to daily panic about their mortgages and mutual funds. But while we fret for our financial security, the volatility in global asset prices and commodities resulting from the U.S. financial crisis will have global reach, threatening the …
Don’t Forget the Already Poor
Edward Miguel
Marketplace
Audio available via Marketplace (19:50). We’re all glued to Wall Street’s implosion and for good reason. We’re worried about falling home values and our 401k’s. The crisis will also hit the world’s poorest people in Africa, Asia and Latin America who are least able to buffer the shock. For one, in the recent Vice Presidential …