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Devotion or Deprivation: Did Catholicism Retard French Development?

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  • Morgan Kelly

Abstract

Squicciarini (AER, 2020) finds that the parts of France with the most refractory clergy during the Revolution had the lowest industrial employment in 1901, and concludes that Catholicism retarded development. However, because the richest regions were the ones that industrialized, whereas the poorest ones were the most devout, the relationship may be confounded by living standards. If we add a range of simple controls for living standards the claimed result immediately disappears, as it does if alternative measures of religiosity are employed. Regarding education, I find that Catholic schools were established in areas that historically had the fewest public schools and the lowest enrolment of girls relative to boys. Instead of simply indoctrinating children, religious orders appear to have provided a basic education in impoverished places where it was otherwise unavailable, for girls especially.

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  • Morgan Kelly, 2021. "Devotion or Deprivation: Did Catholicism Retard French Development?," Working Papers 202115, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucn:wpaper:202115
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10197/12279
    File Function: First version, 2021
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    1. de la Croix, David & Perrin, Faustine, 2018. "How far can economic incentives explain the French fertility and education transition?," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 221-245.
    2. Mara P. Squicciarini & Nico Voigtländer, 2015. "Human Capital and Industrialization: Evidence from the Age of Enlightenment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 130(4), pages 1825-1883.
    3. Mara P. Squicciarini, 2020. "Devotion and Development: Religiosity, Education, and Economic Progress in Nineteenth-Century France," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 110(11), pages 3454-3491, November.
    4. Nan Zhang & Melissa M. Lee, 2020. "Literacy and State–Society Interactions in Nineteenth‐Century France," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 64(4), pages 1001-1016, October.
    5. Montalbo, Adrien, 2021. "Schools without a law: Primary education in France from the Revolution to the Guizot Law," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
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    Cited by:

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    Keywords

    Primary education; Catholicism; Employment; French Revolution; 19th century Franch; Research methodologies;
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