Can religious norms reduce violent attitudes? Experimental evidence from a Muslim–Christian conflict

Anselm Hager and Kunaal Sharma
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Anselm Hager: 9373Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany
Kunaal Sharma: Independent scholar, New York, USA

Conflict Management and Peace Science, 2023, vol. 40, issue 2, 134-161

Abstract: We study whether religious anti-violence norms can reduce violent attitudes in settings of deep religious divisions. Our study context is a neighborhood in Nairobi with a history of religious violence. We randomly expose 576 Christian and Muslim respondents to anti-violence norms drawn from religious sources and find that the primes reduce violent attitudes by 0.2 standard deviations. We find no evidence, however, that highlighting the norms’ religious source increases their effectiveness. Rather, we show that subjects apply the norms in a literal manner, suggesting that it is the norms’ content that make them effective.

Keywords: Keywords; Extremism, religious scripture; survey experiment; violence (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:compsc:v:40:y:2023:i:2:p:134-161

DOI: 10.1177/07388942221077914

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