IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/mos/moswps/2023-02.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Paddy and Prejudice: Evidence on the Agricultural Origins of Prejudice from China and 12 other Asian Societies

Author

Listed:
  • An Huang

    (Monash University)

  • Paulo Santos

    (Monash University)

  • Russell Smyth

    (Monash University)

Abstract

This paper examines the role of agricultural technology, in the form of paddy rice cultivation, on contemporary levels of prejudice. Using environmental suitability for paddy as an instrumental variable, we find that people living in areas where paddy rice farming has been long practiced exhibit lower prejudice towards outgroup members. This relationship is mediated by greater exposure to markets and trade, itself derived from paddy’s higher land productivity, likely reflecting the opportunities for interpersonal contact created by markets. In contrast, the irrigation needs and high labour demands of paddy galvanize local cooperation, likely fostering prejudice directed to outsiders.

Suggested Citation

  • An Huang & Paulo Santos & Russell Smyth, 2023. "Paddy and Prejudice: Evidence on the Agricultural Origins of Prejudice from China and 12 other Asian Societies," Monash Economics Working Papers 2023-02, Monash University, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:mos:moswps:2023-02
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://monash-econ-wps.s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/RePEc/mos/moswps/2023-02.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fabian Winter & Nan Zhang, 2018. "Social norm enforcement in ethnically diverse communities," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 115(11), pages 2722-2727, March.
    2. Loren Brandt & Debin Ma & Thomas G. Rawski, 2014. "From Divergence to Convergence: Reevaluating the History behind China's Economic Boom," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 52(1), pages 45-123, March.
    3. Cheng, Zhiming & Guo, Wei & Hayward, Mathew & Smyth, Russell & Wang, Haining, 2021. "Childhood adversity and the propensity for entrepreneurship: A quasi-experimental study of the Great Chinese Famine," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 36(1).
    4. Greif, Avner & Tabellini, Guido, 2017. "The clan and the corporation: Sustaining cooperation in China and Europe," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 1-35.
    5. Nunn, Nathan, 2009. "The Importance of History for Economic Development," Scholarly Articles 33077824, Harvard University Department of Economics.
    6. Johansen, Soren & Juselius, Katarina, 1990. "Maximum Likelihood Estimation and Inference on Cointegration--With Applications to the Demand for Money," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 52(2), pages 169-210, May.
    7. Jeanet Sinding Bentzen & Nicolai Kaarsen & Asger Moll Wingender, 2017. "Irrigation and Autocracy," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 15(1), pages 1-53.
    8. Jun Gu & Ingrid Nielsen & Jason Shachat & Russell Smyth & Yujia Peng, 2016. "An experimental study of the effect of intergroup contact on attitudes in urban China," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 53(14), pages 2991-3006, November.
    9. Janssen, Marco A., 2007. "Coordination in irrigation systems: An analysis of the Lansing-Kremer model of Bali," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 93(1-3), pages 170-190, March.
    10. Yannis M. Ioannides & Linda Datcher Loury, 2004. "Job Information Networks, Neighborhood Effects, and Inequality," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 42(4), pages 1056-1093, December.
    11. Louis Putterman & David N. Weil, 2010. "Post-1500 Population Flows and The Long-Run Determinants of Economic Growth and Inequality," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 125(4), pages 1627-1682.
    12. Oded Galor & Ömer Özak, 2016. "The Agricultural Origins of Time Preference," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(10), pages 3064-3103, October.
    13. Deng, Kent, 2000. "A critical survey of recent research in Chinese economic history," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 638, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    14. A. Colin Cameron & Jonah B. Gelbach & Douglas L. Miller, 2008. "Bootstrap-Based Improvements for Inference with Clustered Errors," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(3), pages 414-427, August.
    15. Evert Van de Vliert, 2017. "Climatic imprints on personality," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 1(12), pages 864-865, December.
    16. Carol H. Shiue & Wolfgang Keller, 2007. "Markets in China and Europe on the Eve of the Industrial Revolution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(4), pages 1189-1216, September.
    17. Hirschman, Albert O, 1982. "Rival Interpretations of Market Society: Civilizing, Destructive, or Feeble?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 20(4), pages 1463-1484, December.
    18. Paola Giuliano & Nathan Nunn, 2021. "Understanding Cultural Persistence and Change [Cultural Assimilation During the Age of Mass Migration]," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 88(4), pages 1541-1581.
    19. Keller, Wolfgang & Shiue, Carol H., 2007. "The origin of spatial interaction," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 140(1), pages 304-332, September.
    20. Rachel Kranton & Matthew Pease & Seth Sanders & Scott Huettel, 2020. "Deconstructing bias in social preferences reveals groupy and not-groupy behavior," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 117(35), pages 21185-21193, August.
    21. Alberto Alesina & Paola Giuliano, 2015. "Culture and Institutions," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 53(4), pages 898-944, December.
    22. Jacob Moscona & Nathan Nunn & James A. Robinson, 2017. "Keeping It in the Family: Lineage Organization and the Scope of Trust in Sub-Saharan Africa," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(5), pages 565-571, May.
    23. Johansen, Soren, 1988. "Statistical analysis of cointegration vectors," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 12(2-3), pages 231-254.
    24. Moses Shayo, 2020. "Social Identity and Economic Policy," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 12(1), pages 355-389, August.
    25. Nathan Nunn, 2009. "The Importance of History for Economic Development," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 1(1), pages 65-92, May.
    26. Keller, Wolfgang & Shiue, Carol, 2021. "The Economic Consequences of the Opium War," CEPR Discussion Papers 16242, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    27. Ingrid Nielsen & Chris Nyland & Russell Smyth & Mingqiong Zhang & Cherrie Jiuhua Zhu, 2006. "Effects of Intergroup Contact on Attitudes of Chinese Urban Residents to Migrant Workers," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 43(3), pages 475-490, March.
    28. Hoff, Karla & Pandey, Priyanka, 2014. "Making up people—The effect of identity on performance in a modernizing society," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 118-131.
    29. Michael D. Purugganan & Dorian Q. Fuller, 2009. "The nature of selection during plant domestication," Nature, Nature, vol. 457(7231), pages 843-848, February.
    30. Barker, Randolph & Molle, François, 2004. "Evolution of irrigation in South and Southeast Asia," IWMI Research Reports H035439, International Water Management Institute.
    31. Joan Esteban & Laura Mayoral & Debraj Ray, 2012. "Ethnicity and Conflict: An Empirical Study," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(4), pages 1310-1342, June.
    32. Johannes C. Buggle, 2020. "Growing collectivism: irrigation, group conformity and technological divergence," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 25(2), pages 147-193, June.
    33. Kent G. Deng, 2000. "A critical survey of recent research in Chinese economic history," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 53(1), pages 1-28, February.
    34. Benjamin A. Brooks & Karla Hoff & Priyanka Pandey, 2018. "Cultural impediments to learning to cooperate: An experimental study of high- and low-caste men in rural India," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 115(45), pages 11385-11392, November.
    35. Carol H. Shiue, 2002. "Transport Costs and the Geography of Arbitrage in Eighteenth-Century China," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1406-1419, December.
    36. Masahiko Aoki, 2001. "Toward a Comparative Institutional Analysis," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262011875, December.
    37. Samuel Bowles, 1998. "Endogenous Preferences: The Cultural Consequences of Markets and Other Economic Institutions," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 36(1), pages 75-111, March.
    38. Imai, Kosuke & Yamamoto, Teppei, 2013. "Identification and Sensitivity Analysis for Multiple Causal Mechanisms: Revisiting Evidence from Framing Experiments," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 21(2), pages 141-171, April.
    39. Cao, Jiarui & Xu, Yiqing & Zhang, Chuanchuan, 2022. "Clans and calamity: How social capital saved lives during China's Great Famine," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    40. Christian Dippel & Andreas Ferrara & Stephan Heblich, 2020. "Causal mediation analysis in instrumental-variables regressions," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 20(3), pages 613-626, September.
    41. Pauline Grosjean & Rose Khattar, 2019. "It’s Raining Men! Hallelujah? The Long-Run Consequences of Male-Biased Sex Ratios," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 86(2), pages 723-754.
    42. Conley, T. G., 1999. "GMM estimation with cross sectional dependence," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 92(1), pages 1-45, September.
    43. Dincecco, Mark & Wang, Yuhua, 2018. "Internal Conflict, Elite Action, and State Failure: Evidence from China, 1000-1911," MPRA Paper 87777, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ang, James B. & Madsen, Jakob B. & Wang, Wen, 2021. "Rice farming, culture and democracy," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    2. Carillo, Mario Francesco, 2018. "Fascistville: Mussolini's New Towns and the Persistence of Neo-Fascism," MPRA Paper 96236, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 03 Oct 2019.
    3. Mario F. Carillo, 2022. "Fascistville: Mussolini’s new towns and the persistence of neo-fascism," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 27(4), pages 527-567, December.
    4. Andrew Dickens, 2022. "Understanding Ethnolinguistic Differences: The Roles of Geography and Trade," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 132(643), pages 953-980.
    5. Leonardo M. Klüppel & Lamar Pierce & Jason A. Snyder, 2018. "Perspective—The Deep Historical Roots of Organization and Strategy: Traumatic Shocks, Culture, and Institutions," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(4), pages 702-721, August.
    6. Wolfgang Keller & Carol H. Shiue, 2016. "Market Integration as a Mechanism of Growth," CESifo Working Paper Series 6070, CESifo.
    7. Jayasekara, Dinithi N., 2021. "Can traditional farming practices explain attitudes towards scientific progress?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 320-339.
    8. James B. Ang, 2019. "Agricultural legacy and individualistic culture," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 24(4), pages 397-425, December.
    9. Jean-Louis Combes & Mary-Françoise Renard & Shuo Shi, 2022. "Have Unequal Treaties Fostered Domestic Market Integration in Late Imperial China?," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Antoine Le Riche & Antoine Parent & Lei Zhang (ed.), Institutional Change and China Capitalism Frontier of Cliometrics and its Application to China, chapter 2, pages 3-29, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    10. Leander Heldring, 2019. "The Origins of Violence in Rwanda," HiCN Working Papers 299, Households in Conflict Network.
    11. Johannes C. Buggle, 2020. "Growing collectivism: irrigation, group conformity and technological divergence," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 25(2), pages 147-193, June.
    12. Hoang-Anh Ho & Peter Martinsson & Ola Olsson, 2022. "The origins of cultural divergence: evidence from Vietnam," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 27(1), pages 45-89, March.
    13. Bartels, Charlotte & Jäger, Simon & Obergruber, Natalie, 2020. "Long-Term Effects of Equal Sharing: Evidence from Inheritance Rules for Land," IZA Discussion Papers 13665, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    14. Cemal Eren Arbatlı & Quamrul H. Ashraf & Oded Galor & Marc Klemp, 2020. "Diversity and Conflict," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 88(2), pages 727-797, March.
    15. Fredriksson, Per G. & Mohanty, Aatishya, 2021. "Sunlight and Culture," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 188(C), pages 757-782.
    16. Scott L. Fulford & Ivan Petkov & Fabio Schiantarelli, 2020. "Does it matter where you came from? Ancestry composition and economic performance of US counties, 1850–2010," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 25(3), pages 341-380, September.
    17. Castañeda Dower, Paul & Ginsburgh, Victor & Weber, Shlomo, 2017. "Colonial legacy, polarization and linguistic disenfranchisement: The case of the Sri Lankan War," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 440-448.
    18. P. Buonanno & M. Cervellati & S. Lazzaroni & G. Prarolo, 2022. "Historical social contracts and their legacy: a disaggregated analysis of the medieval republics," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 27(4), pages 485-526, December.
    19. Qiang Chen, 2015. "Climate shocks, dynastic cycles and nomadic conquests: evidence from historical China," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 67(2), pages 185-204.
    20. David Wuepper & Hannes Lang & Emmanuel Benjamin, 2020. "Ancestral Ways of Life and Human Capital Formation in Kenya," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 18(4), pages 571-584, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    paddy rice; prejudice; market; contact hypothesis; group identity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J15 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Minorities, Races, Indigenous Peoples, and Immigrants; Non-labor Discrimination
    • N55 - Economic History - - Agriculture, Natural Resources, Environment and Extractive Industries - - - Asia including Middle East
    • Z1 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:mos:moswps:2023-02. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 bibliographic 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.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Simon Angus (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dxmonau.html .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.