Research

The Renaissance era in Western Europe was marked by a flourishing of economic and cultural life that gave rise to numerous discoveries and inventions. This paper studies the role played by Greek knowledge in this process. Using a newly constructed dataset on Greek migrants in Europe after the fall of Constantinople in 1453, I show that a Greek presence in the second half of the fifteenth century increased city growth in the sixteenth century. In terms of mechanisms, I find that a Greek presence increased the available knowledge stock in astronomy, mathematics, medicine, and humanistic subjects -- fields in which ancient Greek and Byzantine knowledge was especially advanced. Finally, I document an increase in upper-tail human capital and inventions in these cities. My findings thus show the important role played by Greek migrants in disseminating knowledge and the positive impact that Greek knowledge exerted on city growth in the early modern period.

This paper studies how the prehistoric geographic distribution of domesticable transport animal species has contributed to shaping differences in development. I identify the historical ranges of the ten animal species that are (1) suitable for domestication and (2) suitable for carrying loads. Based on these ranges, I create a measure of the prehistoric presence of domesticable transport animals around the world. The empirical analysis reveals a strong relationship between the historical presence of domesticable transport animals and the emergence of ancient long-distance trade routes and early forms of hierarchy. Historical access to domesticable transport animals also continued to matter in the long run: Pre-industrial ethnic groups living in regions historically home to domesticable transport animals were more involved in trade and had built more complex hierarchical structures. Moreover, these groups developed greater numerical skills, larger levels of labor specialization, and higher levels of class stratification, thus underscoring the broad cultural and developmental impacts exerted by historical access to domesticable transport animals.

A distinct feature of the Protestant Reformation was Martin Luther’s intentional use of German, rather than Latin, in his writings. This paper examines the reformers' reliance on the vernacular and its impact on the market for ideas. We document a significant increase in the printing of vernacular works after the start of the Reformation. The increased use of the vernacular expanded the ranks of authors, increased the supply of works from authors with a non-elite background, and broadened thematic coverage. Consequently, a much larger share of the populace could participate in the consumption, creation, and dissemination of printed information.

This paper examines the historical roots of vaccine hesitancy in Germany. Drawing on digitized from the year 1900 on the strength of the naturopathic movement -- the largest movement critical of medicine, including vaccinations, at that time -- we show that counties with a higher number of such associations in 1900 have significantly lower vaccination rates today. In terms of underlying mechanisms, we show that the movement changed the way health care is provided and we present evidence indicating that it affected the intergenerational transmission of norms.

The Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (KPCS) aims to prevent so-called conflict diamonds -- diamonds that originate from conflict zones -- from entering the world market. This paper examines its impact on armed conflict in Africa by exploiting grid-cell level variation in the suitability to extract alluvial (secondary) diamonds and comparing grid cells with and without this suitability before and after the introduction of the KPCS in 2002. We find that the KPCS led to a permanent and significant reduction in armed conflict without triggering increases in other forms of violence. We also provide evidence for geographic spillovers: conflict also declined in neighboring regions. Rebel group-level evidence further shows that after the introduction of the KPCS, rebel groups were less likely to engage in armed conflict and their operations became more geographically concentrated. Overall, the findings suggest that the KPCS effectively limited rebels’ ability to finance violent activities.

We provide evidence that income inequality across ethnicities reduces economic growth. This result is obtained based on a novel and comprehensive dataset of harmonized Gini indices on ethnic inequality for countries and sub-national units between 1992 and 2013. Our approach exploits differentials in nighttime lights (NTL) across ethnic homelands, using new techniques to harmonize NTL series across geographic regions and years to address concerns about spatial and temporal incomparability of satellite photographs. Our measures show that ethnic inequality is widespread across countries and has decreased over time. Our identification strategy exploits the artificialty of sub-national borders to construct instrumental variables for ethnic inequality. The negative effect of ethnic inequality is caused by increasing conflict and decreasing public goods provision.

This paper studies the effects of Alexander the Great's military campaign in the Middle East and Western Asia (334--324 BC) on economic long-run development. Alexander and his successors founded many cities in the region, often with the explicit purpose of fostering long-distance trade. I first show that these cities indeed were more likely to be founded in locations conducive to long-distance trade. Consistent with this, I find that the later-emerging Silk Road is more likely to pass through grid cells geographically close to Hellenic cities, while no such relationship exists for pre-existing cities. The OLS results are supported by a Difference-in-Differences analysis and an instrumental variable approach. Finally, I examine the effects on present-day economic development. Grid cells located closer to Hellenic cities exhibit higher levels of nighttime lights and better connectivity through road and railroad infrastructure. Overall, these results document the great relevance of Alexander's campaign for long-run development by re-setting the urban network in the region and facilitating exchange and long-distance trade between Europe and Asia.

This paper studies the role of geology in the origins of economic development. We argue that a specific geological process---orogenesis, the reshaping of the continental crust by plate collisions---was fundamental for the regional establishment of human structures after the Neolithic Revolution. First, we show that orogenic zones help explain the global distribution of early Neolithic sites. We then turn to the mechanisms that cause this relationship. We find that these zones, as predicted by geology, have more phosphorus-rich soil, groundwater reservoirs, domesticable crops, and natural resources (clay, metals, and obsidian) than other regions. Finally, we show that all of these endowments are relevant for the establishment of early human settlements. Overall, our results indicate that variation in a set of geographic factors relevant for early human development is linked to the same geological process.