{"title":"The Origins of Common Identity: Evidence from Alsace-Lorraine","authors":"Sirus H. Dehdari, Kai Gehring","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3338764","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"We study how more negative historical exposure to the actions of nation-states—like war, occupation, and repression—affects the formation of regional identity. The quasi-exogenous division of the French regions Alsace and Lorraine allows us to implement a geographical regression discontinuity design at the municipal level. Using measures of stated and revealed preferences, we find that more negative experiences with nation-states are associated with a stronger regional identity in the short, medium, and long run. This is linked to preferences for more regional decision-making. Establishing regional organizations seems to be a key mechanism to maintaining and strengthening regional identity. (JEL H77, N43, N44, N93, N94, Z13)","PeriodicalId":112052,"journal":{"name":"Organizations & Markets: Formal & Informal Structures eJournal","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"28","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Organizations & Markets: Formal & Informal Structures eJournal","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3338764","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 28
Abstract
We study how more negative historical exposure to the actions of nation-states—like war, occupation, and repression—affects the formation of regional identity. The quasi-exogenous division of the French regions Alsace and Lorraine allows us to implement a geographical regression discontinuity design at the municipal level. Using measures of stated and revealed preferences, we find that more negative experiences with nation-states are associated with a stronger regional identity in the short, medium, and long run. This is linked to preferences for more regional decision-making. Establishing regional organizations seems to be a key mechanism to maintaining and strengthening regional identity. (JEL H77, N43, N44, N93, N94, Z13)