Regional resources and democratic secessionism

Kai Gehring and Stephan Schneider

Journal of Public Economics, 2020, vol. 181, issue C

Abstract: Although resources have been shown to influence secessionist conflicts in developing countries, their effect in established democracies has largely been neglected. We integrate regional resources and inter-regional transfers in a model of democratic secession, and show that relative regional income correlates positively with secessionist party success in a large panel of regions. To establish causality, our difference-in-differences and triple-differences designs exploit that Scotland and Wales both feature separatist parties, but only an independent Scotland would profit from oil discoveries off its coast. We document an economically and statistically significant positive effect of regional resources and rule out plausible alternative explanations.

Keywords: Fiscal federalism; Inter-regional transfers; Redistribution; Secession; Separatism; Resources; Economic voting (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D70 H77 N9 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (13)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Regional Resources and Democratic Secessionism (2018)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:pubeco:v:181:y:2020:i:c:s0047272719301343

DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2019.104073

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