Research

Abstract: Why do voters in developed democracies support right-wing populist parties? Existing research focuses on economic and cultural vulnerability as driving this phenomenon. We hypothesize that perceptions of personal health vulnerability might have a similar effect on voters. To test this argument, we analyze all waves of the European Social Survey (2002–2018). Our findings suggest that voters with worse self-reported health were significantly more likely to vote for right-wing populist parties. This relationship persists even after accounting for measures of cultural and economic vulnerability, as well as voters’ satisfaction with both their personal lives and their country’s health system. The influence of health on support for populist parties appears to be greater than that of education and self-reported economic insecurity, while lesser than that of income and attitudes about immigrants. Our findings suggest that policies affecting public health could shape not only health outcomes but also the political landscape.  

Abstract: Does pre-colonial history – and in particular the role of interstate warfare – help explain long-run development patterns across India? To address this question, we construct a new geocoded database of historical conflicts on the Indian subcontinent. We document a robust positive relationship between pre-colonial conflict exposure and local economic development today. Drawing on archival and secondary data, we show that districts that were more exposed to pre-colonial conflict experienced greater early state-making, followed by lower political violence and higher investments in physical and human capital in the long term.

Abstract: Do refugees reshape long-term political behavior in receiving areas? I argue that forced migration can foster a strong group identity among refugees, which can mobilize them toward political parties that champion their identity-based grievances. To test this argument, I examine how one of the largest forced migrations in modern history, the expulsion of ethnic Germans from Eastern Europe into Germany after WWII, shaped their electoral behavior over time. Using an original database of district-level data from 32 elections spanning a century, I find that communities which received greater shares of expellees remain more supportive of the expellees’ political champions—the radical right—over time. This relationship is particularly manifested when identity-based grievances are unresolved and politically salient. Mechanism evidence, including novel data on expellee monuments and associations, suggests that a durable expellee identity helps account for these results. My analysis reveals an enduring behavioral legacy resulting from forced migration.  

Abstract: How do Filipinos remember their history? To date this question still has no systematic answer. This article provides quantitative, descriptive results from two nationally representative surveys that show how Filipinos view three of the country’s major historical events: the Spanish colonization of the Philippines; martial law under President Ferdinand Marcos; and the 1986 People Power Revolution. The descriptive results include several takeaways, including: first, the modal response towards all three events was indifference (versus positive or negative feelings); second, positive feelings towards martial law were highest among those who were alive at that time; third, the distribution of feelings towards these historical events was similar across individuals with different educational achievement; and finally, a surprising proportion of respondents expressed positive feelings towards both martial law and People Power. We discuss the potential limitations of our study and conclude by considering the implications of these results for the Philippines’ contemporary politics.

Abstract: In May of 2022, Bongbong Marcos won a commanding 59 percent of the vote to become president of the Philippines. His victory was, on some level, shocking to scholars and analysts of Philippine politics. As a result, a plethora of di erent theories have been proposed, in an attempt to explain why Marcos won. In this paper, we use nationally representative survey data to explore which factors predict (and do not predict) voting intention for Marcos. We find that, a) support for former President Rodrigo Duterte, b) positive perceptions of the late President Ferdinand Marcos and martial law, and c) ethnic (linguistic) identity are strong predictors of voting for Bongbong Marcos. On the other hand, age, education, and income are not. Consequently, theories based on continuity, coalition, history, and identity provide the most leverage on the question of why Bongbong Marcos won the election.

Abstract: What is the relationship between trust in religious leaders and compliance with policies that are costly to the individual? Religious leaders often have the moral authority to affect individuals’ willingness to adopt prosocial behaviors. Yet, that influence can be either positive or negative because religious leaders face mixed incentives to encourage compliance and their leadership is often decentralized. We argue that greater trust in religious leaders will increase compliance in countries with a dominant religion and centralized religious authority because religious leaders will offer a coherent message that aligns with state directives. We test our hypotheses using data from surveys fielded in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan during the COVID-19 pandemic. We find a positive and significant relationship between trust and voluntary compliance only in Kazakhstan, where religious leaders reduced the costs of compliance by enabling adherents to practice their faith while social distancing. We thus identify an alternative mechanism whereby trust promotes compliance.

Objectives: An effective vaccine to SARS-CoV-2 cannot be successfully deployed if a significant number of people worldwide are unwilling to accept it. We investigated the relationship between trust in scientists and medical professionals and perceptions of vaccine safety and effectiveness. We also build on past studies by exploring the relationship between confidence in global health organizations and vaccine hesitancy.

Methods: We conducted an online survey in seventeen countries/territories across five world regions between May -June 2020. We assessed the relationship between COVID19 vaccine hesitancy, confidence in public health organizations, and trust in key experts and leaders.

Results: Our findings strongly suggest that confidence in the World Health Organization combined with trust in domestic scientists and healthcare professionals is a strong driver of vaccine acceptance across multiple countries/territories.

Conclusion: We find that hesitancy is widespread, and uptake would be insufficient to achieve herd immunity. There is widespread confidence in how public health organizations have responded to the current pandemic and this is related to vaccine acceptance. Our results also highlight the important role of trust in health care providers and scientists in reducing COVID19 vaccine hesitancy.

Abstract: What influences the adoption of SARS-CoV-2 mitigation behaviors–both personal, such as mask wearing and frequent handwashing, and social, such as avoiding large gatherings and physical contact–across countries? Understanding why some individuals are more willing to change their behavior to mitigate the spread of a pandemic will not only help us to address the current SARS-CoV-2 pandemic but also to respond to future ones. Researchers have pointed to a variety of factors that may influence individual adoption of personal and social mitigation behaviors, including social inequality, risk perception, personality traits, and government policies. While not denying the importance of these factors, we argue that the role of trust and confidence has received insufficient attention to date. Our study explores whether there is a difference in the way trust and confidence in particular leaders and organizations affect individual compliance and whether this effect is consistent across different types of mitigation behaviors. Specifically, we utilize an original cross-national survey conducted during the first wave of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic (May-June 2020) to investigate how trust in scientists, medical professionals, politicians, and religious leaders and confidence in global, national, and local health organizations affects individual compliance in 16 countries/territories across five world regions. Our analyses, which control for the aforementioned factors as well as several others, suggest that trust in politicians and confidence in national health ministries have the most consistent influence on whether individuals adopt both personal and social mitigation behaviors. Across our sample, we find that greater trust in politicians is associated with lower levels of individual compliance with public health directives, whereas greater confidence in the national health ministry is associated with higher levels of individual compliance. Our findings suggest the need to understand trust and confidence as among the most important individual level characteristics driving compliance when developing and delivering messaging about the adoption of mitigation behaviors. The content of the message, it seems, will be most effective when citizens across countries trust its source. Trusted sources, such as politicians and the national health ministry, should thus consider working closely together when determining and communicating recommended health behaviors to avoid contradicting one another. 

Abstract: Directed Self-Placement (DSP) refers to an increasingly utilized approach to writing placement in both two- and four-year institutions that both informs students of their writing course options and expectations at their institution and allows them to decide for themselves what course best fits their needs. One reason for its popularity as a method is its purported ability, when locally designed and maintained, to serve as a more equitable and antiracist form of writing placement than some alternatives. In order to test these claims, this study examines five years of placement, enrollment, and GPA data from first-year writing (FYW) classes. Descriptive data analysis reveals that DSP as locally administered has different social consequences for domestic under-represented minority (URM) minoritized students and women than for non-under-represented minority (non-URM) minoritized students and men. The data also reveal that student non-conformity to DSP placement recommendations does not result in significant underperformance in FYW. It would appear that at this institution “an admitted student is a qualified student.”

Abstract: When evaluating the impact of naming and shaming on public opinion regarding human rights, existing scholarship focuses on messages coming from ingroup or outgroup critics. Diaspora critics, increasingly vocal and visible in recent years, occupy an in-between identity. What, if any, is the impact of criticism coming from such critics? We address this question by fielding a pre-registered survey experiment in Israel, a country that routinely faces diasporic criticism. We find that exposure to criticism from both diaspora and foreign critics (but not from domestic critics) triggered a backlash response on the criticized issue (human rights) compared to a no criticism condition. However, diaspora critics have a slight advantage over foreigners – their intentions for criticizing the state are perceived as more positive. Despite limited direct impact on public opinion, our findings suggest that the human rights regime could benefit from involving diasporic and domestic actors in their efforts. 

Abstract: Existing research, including work specific to COVID-19, suggests that endorsement by medical practitioners increases vaccine uptake. Yet, vaccine hesitancy persists despite health professionals continuing to widely endorse multiple vaccines to combat COVID-19 since late 2020. Could endorsement by other trusted leaders reduce vaccine hesitancy? Although some studies suggest that trust in religious leaders can influence individuals' health attitudes and behaviors, the evidence is mixed. Our study explores the potential added value of messaging by religious leaders across religious traditions – specifically, it asks whether their endorsement of the COVID-19 vaccine might increase vaccine uptake in an environment where health professionals are already endorsing vaccines. To investigate this question, we conducted an online survey experiment with 6,000 respondents across five countries with different dominant religions (Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam). Respondents were randomly assigned to either a control group that only included endorsement by medical practitioners or a treatment group that added either endorsement by religious leaders or, for comparative purposes, endorsement by political leaders. We found that endorsement by religious leaders reduced vaccine hesitancy only in one country. These findings corroborate existing research that medical practitioners are the best line of defense to combat vaccine hesitancy. They also suggest the limitations of endorsement by non-experts.

Abstract: The study of populism is chiefly concerned with the actors who wield it (i.e., “populists”) and the consequences of their actions for regime stability. Yet, scholars have spent more time arguing over definitions of populism than identifying and differentiating populists. We seek to address these gaps. First, we distill populism into three core elements that can be used to identify which actors employ populism irrespective of their geographical, historical and political context. Consistently identifying populists enables us to preserve the analytical value of populism, while still recognizing the diversity among populists. Second, we develop a typology to capture this diversity along two key dimensions: 1) their position within the political landscape; and 2) the degree of their ideological commitment to populism. The four resulting ideal types of populists – Oppositional, Classical, Pivot, and Strategic – carry different implications for regime stability based on what we identify as their distinct paths to power.

Abstract: Globalization creates winners and losers, and recent research emphasizes that large corporations are among the biggest beneficiaries from trade while smaller firms may be harmed. How do these redistributive effects impact trade attitudes? We find that Americans who believe that ‘big firms win’ are more negative about trade. We then show experimentally that informing citizens that large corporations benefit from trade makes them markedly more hostile towards trade compared to a treatment emphasizing that firms in exporting industries benefit (and compared to a control condition). Using subgroup and causal mediation analysis, we find that anti-corporate sentiment, particularly concern about corporations’ power in society, is driving this finding, not material concerns about jobs. Our findings illustrate how distributive effects and moral beliefs interact to shape attitudes over economic policy.

Abstract: Health shocks may drive the public to support policies that protect health and well-being. Did the COVID-19 pandemic, as one such shock, shift popular opinion on health reform in the United States? Using nationally representative surveys of over 70,000 Americans between 2019 and 2020, we find that experiences with COVID-19 — measured at both the individual and community levels — increased support for Medicare for All by multiple percentage points. We find that the associ- ation is especially driven by non-partisans. To reduce concerns of reverse causality and confound- ing, we use data from multiple points in time to establish the expected temporal relationship be- tween experiences with COVID-19 and support for health reform. Together, our findings suggest that the pandemic shifted attitudes on health reform, even if briefly, in the lead-up to the 2020 presidential election.

Abstract: Immigration is a contentious political issue. Efforts to stem immigration, while applauded by some, can impose costs on citizens. Do voters reward or punish such actions even when they infringe on democratic freedoms? We tackle this question in the context of the migration crisis that unfolded on the Poland-Belarus border in 2021. To curb migrant flows, Poland introduced a state of emergency along the border. This policy also infringed on democratic freedoms, including limitations on freedom of movement and assembly. In pre-registered analyses, we exploit the highly localized nature of these restrictions to investigate their electoral consequences, drawing on 2019 and 2023 parliamentary elections. Using a difference-in-discontinuities design, we will examine how voters evaluate the tradeoff between policy and democratic freedoms, seeking to understand the broader implications for democratic societies.

Abstract: We study the impact of a permanent positive productivity shock -- the introduction of New World crops -- on violent conflict in Asia. Using difference in differences and event study frameworks, we document a robust positive relationship between gains in caloric suitability due to the Columbian Exchange and greater conflict. We argue that a rapacity effect -- an increase in the potential prize from resource appropriation to political actors -- is the mechanism that best explains this result. We show that conflict was more likely in areas that became more populated and urbanized following gains in caloric suitability, and that areas that experienced gains in caloric suitability were more likely to be conquered by Britain. Our findings shed new light on the Great Divergence in historical socioeconomic outcomes between Europe and Asia. 

Abstract: Seeking international support to counter Russia’s February 2022 invasion, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has publicly addressed foreign politicians and publics in several democratic nations. Media coverage paid special attention to his explicit comparison of Ukraine’s current situation to salient historical events in the audience countries. Since public opinion can influence foreign policy decisions in democracies, we investigate whether evoking the audience country’s past effectively increases popular support for aiding Ukraine. We conducted survey experiments simultaneously in four countries where Zelensky delivered speeches rich in historical parallels – Germany and Israel (Holocaust), United Kingdom (WWII), and United States (Pearl Harbor and 9/11). Exposure to excerpts from Zelensky's speeches triggered distinctive emotional reactions in all countries consistent with the content tailored for each country. Only in Israel did exposure increase public support for bolstering Ukraine’s war efforts. Thus, while rhetoric emphasizing past-present commonalities might evoke emotional reactions, its persuasive potential appears limited.

Abstract: How do the effects of climate regulation on businesses impact public attitudes toward climate policy? While emissions intensity is the primary frame for understanding the effects of climate policy on business, theoretical scholarship and public discourse describe an alternative account: large firms will adjust to climate regulations easily while smaller firms will struggle. Because small businesses are sympathetic and large firms are unpopular, individuals who view climate regulation’s effects in line with this firm size account should be less likely to support climate change mitigation. To test this theory, we conduct an original survey of climate policy beliefs and then a survey experiment. We find evidence that distaste for large corporations interacts with beliefs about climate policy’s effects to shape climate policy attitudes. This work contributes to the literature on moral political economy, and on the enduring difficulty of enacting effective climate change regulation within the United States.

Abstract: We study the relationship between exposure to historical conflict involving heavy weaponry and male-favoring gender norms. We argue that the physical nature of such conflict produced cultural norms favoring males and male offspring. We fo- cus on spatial variation in gender norms across India, a dynamic developing econ- omy in which gender inequality persists. We show robust evidence that areas with high exposure to pre-colonial conflict are significantly more likely to exhibit male- favoring gender norms as measured by male-biased sex ratios and crimes against women. We document how conflict-related gender norms have been transmitted over time via male-favoring folkloric traditions, the gender identity of temple gods, and male-biased marriage practices, and have been transmitted across space by mi- grants originally from areas with high conflict exposure.

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