 The colonial legacy in India: How persistent are the effects of historical institutions?Lakshmi Iyer and Coleson Weir Journal of Development Economics, 2025, vol. 177, issue C Abstract: Using updated data, we analyze the long-run effects of two British colonial institutions established in India. Iyer (2010) showed that areas under direct colonial rule had fewer schools, health centers, and roads than areas under indirect colonial rule. Two decades later, we find that these differences have been eliminated, and that the gaps in poverty, health and educational attainment are also smaller. Banerjee and Iyer (2005) found lower agricultural investments and productivity in areas with landlord-based colonial land tenure systems. Our updated data finds that only some of these differences have been eliminated, while others have remained constant and even widened. Consistent with this lack of convergence, we find that non-landlord areas continue to have higher educational attainment and lower poverty rates six decades after the end of colonial rule. We conclude that the impact of colonial institutions can eventually fade away under the influence of targeted policies. Keywords: Historical institutions; Colonial rule; Land tenure; Agriculture; Public goods; India (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:deveco:v:177:y:2025:i:c:s0304387825001270 DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2025.103576 Access Statistics for this article Journal of Development Economics is currently edited by M. R. Rosenzweig More articles in Journal of Development Economics from Elsevier |
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