Work

Persistent Effects of Colonial Land Tenure Institutions: Village-Level Evidence from India

Year: 2022

Type: article

Abstract: This paper estimates the causal impact of land revenue institutions on long run rural development using a Geographical Regression Discontinuity framework on a new village level data set from colonial India. An early 19th century historical quirk meant that villages in close geographical proximity were assigned to different property rights systems - some falling under landlords and others under the government. Villages that were assigned to landlords in the colonial era are shown to have lower developmental outcomes into the 21st century, including lower per capita consumption and mean light intensity. This paper provides evidence that a part of this divergence occurred in the colonial period. However, historical differences during the colonial period laid the foundation for greater divergence in the post-independence period, driven primarily by the differing potential to benefit from the Green Revolution.

Source: Journal of Development Economics

DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2023.103247

Author: Vigyan D. Ratnoo

Institution: Utrecht University

Language: English

Topic: Land Rights and Reforms

Subfield: Soil Science

Field: Agricultural and Biological Sciences

Domain: Life Sciences

SDG: Reduced inequalities

Open Access status: hybrid

Estimated APC paid: $3,770