IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cdi/wpaper/100.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Ethnicity, Communication and Growth

Author

Listed:
  • Jean-Louis ARCAND

    ()

  • Patrick GUILLAUMONT

    () (Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches sur le Développement International(CERDI))

  • Sylviane GUILLAUMONT JEANNENEY

    () (Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches sur le Développement International(CERDI))

Abstract

In this paper we consider the link often alleged between ethnic diversity and the growth rate of GDP per capita. We first assume that it is ethnic polarization rather than ethnic fragmentation that is harmful for growth so that the relationship may be non-linear. Second, we hypothesize that the impact of ethnic diversity on growth may depend on communication costs. This leads us to estimate a traditional growth rate equation on cross sectional data in a switching regression framework. In "low communication costs countries", the relationship between growth and ethnic diversity is U-shaped. On the other hand, in "high communication costs countries", growth is a decreasing function of ethnic diversity and the severity of the latter's deleterious impact is an increasing function of communication costs, proxied here by the illiteracy rate. The regime that a country belongs to is a function of two proxies for communication costs: the illiteracy rate and population density. The impact of ethnic diversity on growth seems not to operate through macroeconomic policy choices. Rather it is a direct transmission mechanism, in which ethnic diversity affects private and public ressource allocation, that appears to dominate.

Suggested Citation

  • Jean-Louis ARCAND & Patrick GUILLAUMONT & Sylviane GUILLAUMONT JEANNENEY, 1999. "Ethnicity, Communication and Growth," Working Papers 199901, CERDI.
    • Handle: RePEc:cdi:wpaper:100
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://publi.cerdi.org/ed/1999/1999.01.pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Guillaumont, Patrick & Jeanneney, Sylviane Guillaumont & Brun, Jean-Francois, 1999. "How Instability Lowers African Growth," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies (CSAE), vol. 8(1), pages 87-107, March.
    2. Collier, Paul & Hoeffler, Anke, 1998. "On Economic Causes of Civil War," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 50(4), pages 563-573, October.
    3. Schiff, Maurice, 1998. "Ethnic Diversity and Economic Reform in Sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies (CSAE), vol. 7(3), pages 348-362, October.
    4. Jan Willem Gunning & Paul Collier, 1999. "Explaining African Economic Performance," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 37(1), pages 64-111, March.
    5. Alesina, Alberto & Drazen, Allan, 1991. "Why Are Stabilizations Delayed?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(5), pages 1170-1188, December.
    6. William Easterly & Ross Levine, 1997. "Africa's Growth Tragedy: Policies and Ethnic Divisions," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 112(4), pages 1203-1250.
    7. Paolo Mauro, 1995. "Corruption and Growth," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 110(3), pages 681-712.
    8. Sachs, Jeffrey D & Warner, Andrew M, 1997. "Sources of Slow Growth in African Economies," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies (CSAE), vol. 6(3), pages 335-376, October.
    9. Dani Rodrik, 1998. "Trade Policy and Economic Performance in Sub-Saharan Africa," NBER Working Papers 6562, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Temple, Jonathan, 1998. "Initial Conditions, Social Capital and Growth in Africa," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies (CSAE), vol. 7(3), pages 309-347, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Campos, Nauro F & Kuzeyev, Vitaliy S., 2007. "On the Dynamics of Ethnic Fractionalization," IZA Discussion Papers 2822, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
    2. Jean-Louis Arcand & Patrick Guillaumont & Sylviane Guillaumont Jeanneney, 2000. "How to make a tragedy: on the alleged effect of ethnicity on growth," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 12(7), pages 925-938.
    3. Patrick Guillaumont, 2009. "An Economic Vulnerability Index: Its Design and Use for International Development Policy," Oxford Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(3), pages 193-228.
    4. Patrick GUILLAUMONT, 2007. "EVI and its Use. Design of an Economic Vulnerability Index and its Use for International Development Policy," Working Papers 200714, CERDI.
    5. Mama Ouattara, 2004. "HIV infection and economic growth," Journal of Economic Policy Reform, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(3), pages 141-149.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cdi:wpaper:100. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Vincent Mazenod). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/ceauvfr.html .

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.