The Laboratory for Comparative Social Research announces the next regular seminar, which will be held in Moscow (Myasnitskaya st., 22, room 511) on March 3 at 18-00 p.m. Denis Ivanov (Research Fellow at the Institute for Industrial and Market Studies / International Center for the Study of Institutions and Development, Higher School of Economics) will deliver a report “Do Institutions Cause Social Trust? Evidence from an Institutional Reform”

I disentangle a problem of causality between institutional quality and interpersonal trust using evidence from a natural experiment: mid-2000s institutional reforms in the post-Soviet nation of Georgia. The reforms following the 2003 Rose Revolution were swift and extensive, covering a broad range of issues. Combating corruption and organized crime along with improving the law enforcement system has become a trademark of Georgia. The country’s rapid progress in institutional quality was documented by numerous international rankings and sociological surveys. At the same time, the neighboring nations of Armenia and Azerbaijan, both former Soviet republics with cultural and economic background similar to the Georgian one, experienced no such change, thus turning into credible counterfactual to Georgia in absence of the reform.

I show that the institutional reform has led to higher interpersonal trust in two basic ways. Firstly, I use a diff-in-diff design with World Values Survey data pertaining to the periods before and after the reforms. Georgia is a treatment group; Armenia and Azerbaijan form a control group.

Secondly, I exploit the fact that republics’ borders during the Soviet era were often drawn with negligence towards actual ethnic group settlement patterns, thus creating a number of minorities separated from their ethnic compatriots by an arbitrary border. Georgia also has several districts with predominantly Armenian and Azeri population spanning along its southern border. Comparing people of the same ethnic group on both sides of the border allows concentrating on differences in governance and formal institutions and to diminish possible confounding effect of culture-related heterogeneity.

Using the Life in Transition and Caucasian Barometer surveys, I find that Armenian and Azeri residents of Georgia have greater level of interpersonal trust than their counterparts in Armenia and Azerbaijan. Perceptions of corruption and rule of law are likely channels of influence. Results of diff-in-diff design on World Values Survey data generally corroborate these findings.

Everyone interested is invited!

Working language is English.

Videoconference with St. Petersburg office of the LCSR (room 303, 55-2, Sedova st.) will be provided. Guests are free to enter the building.

Guests from Moscow are free to enter to the 5th floor from 17:45 till 18:15. For questions: +7-495-772-95-90 extension number 12244.

Also after the seminar a videotape will be put up after the summary of the presentation.