Presidential Address Institutions and Culture

Guido Tabellini

Journal of the European Economic Association, 2008, vol. 6, issue 2-3, 255-294

Abstract: How and why does distant political and economic history shape the functioning of current institutions? This paper argues that individual values and convictions about the scope of application of norms of good conduct provide the "missing link." Evidence from a variety of sources points to two main findings. First, individual values consistent with generalized (as opposed to limited) morality are widespread in societies that were ruled by non-despotic political institutions in the distant past. Second, well-functioning institutions are often observed in countries or regions where individual values are consistent with generalized morality, and under different identifying assumptions this suggests a causal effect from values to institutional outcomes. The paper ends with a discussion of the implications for future research. (JEL: A10, D7, E00) (c) 2008 by the European Economic Association.

JEL-codes: A10 D7 E00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (460)

Downloads: (external link)
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1542-4774/issues link to full text (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:tpr:jeurec:v:6:y:2008:i:2-3:p:255-294

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of the European Economic Association is currently edited by Xavier Vives, George-Marios Angeletos, Orazio P. Attanasio, Fabio Canova and Roberto Perotti

More articles in Journal of the European Economic Association from MIT Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by The MIT Press ().