Erasing Ethnicity? Propaganda, Nation Building, and Identity in Rwanda

Arthur Blouin and Sharun Mukand

Journal of Political Economy, 2019, vol. 127, issue 3, 1008 - 1062

Abstract: This paper examines whether propaganda broadcast over radio helped to change interethnic attitudes in postgenocide Rwanda. We exploit variation in exposure to the government’s radio propaganda due to the mountainous topography of Rwanda. Results of lab-in-the-field experiments show that individuals exposed to government propaganda have lower salience of ethnicity, have increased interethnic trust, and show more willingness to interact face-to-face with members of another ethnic group. Our results suggest that the observed improvement in interethnic behavior is not cosmetic and reflects a deeper change in interethnic attitudes. The findings provide some of the first quantitative evidence that the salience of ethnic identity can be manipulated by governments.

Date: 2019
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (74)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/701441 (application/pdf)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/701441 (text/html)
Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.

Related works:
Working Paper: Erasing Ethnicity? Propaganda, Nation Building and Identity in Rwanda (2019)
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:ucp:jpolec:doi:10.1086/701441

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Political Economy from University of Chicago Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Journals Division ().