Culture Flashcards
Culture definitions
- Alesina and Giuliano - ‘those customary beliefs and values that ethnic, religious, and social groups transmit fairly unchanged from generation to generation’
- Greif - culture is ‘ideas and thoughts common to several individuals that govern interaction —between these people, and between them, their gods, and other groups— and differ from knowledge in that they are not empirically discovered or analytically proved’.
- Temin - culture denotes ‘distinctive attitudes and actions that differentiate groups of people’
- Gorodnichenko and Roland - culture is a ‘set of values and beliefs people have about how the world (both nature and soceity) works, as well as the norms of behavior derived from that set of values’
Arrow
Importance of trust. Every commercial transaction has an element of trust, and much of the economic backwardness in the world can be explained by the lack of mutual confidence
Greif
Culture shapes institutions. Analyses collectivism in Muslim world compared to individualism in the Latin world. A collectivist system is more efficient in supporting intraeconomy agency relations and requires less costly formal organizations, such as courts, whilst individualist cultural beliefs foster the development of such enforcement institutions, leading to higher economic growth in the long run.
Compares merchant organisation in Italy and North Africa in the medieval period, arguing there are principal-agent issues in trade. North Africa had collectivist cultural beliefs, which led to institutions based on group’s ability to use economic, social and moral sanctions against deviants. Italy had individualist cultural beliefs, so societal organization was based on legal, political and second party economic organizations for enforcement and coordination
Gorodnichenko and Roland
Individualism is a ‘cultural trait that emphasizes personal freedom and achievement. It therefore awards social status to personal accomplishments’, and collectivism ‘emphasizes the embeddedness of individuals in a larger group. It encourages conformity to a group and loyalty to and respect for one’s superiors, and it discourages individuals from dissenting and standing out’.
Individualism is better than collectivism for growth, shown by relationship between individualism and GDP. Individualism leads to increased innovation and growth because of its emphasis on personal freedom and achievement, and its award of social status to personal accomplishments, such as important discoveries. Countries with a more individualistic culture are more likely to adopt democracy (though those who live in democracies may also be more inclined to embrace individualist values)
BUT relationship can go the other way - immigrants realise that they should become individualistic because institutions encourage that
Bazzi et al
The American frontier gave rise to a culture of ‘rugged individualism’, which has persisted until now. Places which spent more time with the ‘total frontier experience’ is associated with preferences for less social spending and transfers and higher Republican vote share
1) frontier locations attracted individualists able to thrive in harsh conditions
2) frontier conditions—isolation and low population density—further cultivated self-reliance, and they offered favorable prospects for upward mobility through effort, nurturing hostility to redistribution
3) frontier conditions shaped local culture at a critical juncture, thus generating persistent effects.
Merton
Supports Gorodnichenko and Roland - social reward with heightened status is the most significant part of the total reward for scientists, as opposed to things like monetary renumeration
Liker
Culture cannot be reproduced. Copying Japanese organization inside U.S. automobile factories failed - American carmakers could replicate lean production but could not imitate Toyota’s culture
Becker and Woessmann
Alternative theory to Weber’s Protestant work ethic - Protestant economies prospered because instruction in reading the Bible generated the human capital crucial to economic prosperity In Protestantism. Luther explicitly promoted the expansion of education, demanding that every town should have schools to teach the scriptures, and such greater literacy led to development
Temin
Anglo-Saxon culture’s social capital was uniquely suited to the progress of industrialisation. Predicted that Japan’s collective culture may give it an economic edge in the coming years (which was wrong).
(Shows that using culture to predict ex ante is quite difficult)
Nannicini et al
Culture leads to different rates of accountability within democracies, impacting economic policies and growth. In localities with a higher level of social capital, citizens are more likely to hold politicians accountable for the aggregate social welfare of the community, punishing politicians who pursue vested interests and grab rents for specific groups. This is in stark opposition to ‘uncivic’ agents who vote based on their own or group-specific interests, and are more tolerant of amoral politicians.
Mokyr
Determinant of the Industrial Revolution was social norms which emphasised honesty, commitment and cooperation, which led to increased innovation.
Two institutional advantages in Britain: 1) low barriers of entry into most professions, 2) reliable information and credible commitments allowed exchanges between people who may not have known one another very well and whose interests were not harmonious
General: 1) informal norms and codes of behavior are as important as the formal rule of law; and 2) institutions are intimately related to ideology. Societies will set up institutions that are the outcome of both interests and beliefs.
Alesina and Giuliano
Describe culture as informal rules and institutions as formal rules. Argue that trust can affect financial development; the legal system can enforce financial contracts, but without trust, it is costly to involve the courts
Argue for a two-way causal effect between cultures and institutions. Good institutions foster generalized morality, reducing legal caseloads and court crowding. Poor institutions do the opposite, decreasing morality and making people more litigious, cluttering the legal system. Culture and institutions interact and evolve in a complementary way, with mutual feedback effects
Alesina and Fuchs-Schündeln
Examine if individual policy preferences are exogenous or endogenous to political regimes. Examine the preferences of Germans based on two events: separation due to military defeat in WWII and reunification after the collapse of the Soviet Union. After reunification, East Germans remained more pro-government than West Germans, maybe due to indoctrination or being accustomed to an intrusive government. Shows that institutions can affect culture and beliefs, and that political regimes can have strong effects on individual preferences. In the example, the effects of Communism were long-lasting
Bowles
Economic institutions influence motivations and values, identifying five effects of markets and other economic institutions on preferences. For example, economic institutions may shape intrinsic and extrinsic preferences: the ample scope of market choices and often extrinsic nature of market rewards may induce preference changes driven by individual desires for feelings of competence and self-determination. The rise of feminist values, reduction in family size and transformation of sexual practices came with women entering the labour force
