Violent conflict and parochial trust: Lab-in-the-field and survey evidence

Katharina Werner and Ahmed Skali

Journal of Development Economics, 2025, vol. 177, issue C

Abstract: How does conflict exposure affect trust? We hypothesize that direct (first-hand) experience with conflict induces parochialism: trust towards out-groups worsens, but trust towards in-groups, owing to positive experiences of kin solidarity, may improve. Indirect exposure to conflict through third-party accounts, on the other hand, reduces trust toward everyone, arguably owing to negativity bias. We find consistent support for our hypotheses in a lab-in-the-field experiment in Maluku, Indonesia, which witnessed a salient Christian-Muslim conflict during 1999–2002, as well as in three cross-country datasets exploiting temporal and spatial variation in exposure to violence. Our results help resolve a seeming contradiction in the literature and inform policies on resolving conflicts.

Keywords: Trust; Conflict; Direct exposure; Indirect exposure; Religion; Discrimination (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C93 D74 Z12 Z13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:deveco:v:177:y:2025:i:c:s0304387825001014

DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2025.103550

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