Abstract
The geography-institutions-income hypothesis is re-examined and the importance of cultural beliefs and practices in influencing economic development is presented as an additional link in the chain of causality from geography to economic development. The work of behavioural ecologists, anthropologists and cross-cultural psychologists is examined to support the notion that certain cultural traits are influenced by environmental factors such as climate, ecology and topography. Connections are also made between culture and institutions. An empirical analysis using anthropological data on cross-cultural traits demonstrates a link between geography and culture.
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
Masters and MacMillan 2001.
- 3.
Olsson and Hibbs 2005.
- 4.
Bleaney and Dimico 2011.
- 5.
Ashraf and Galor 2011a.
- 6.
- 7.
Acemoglu et al. 2001.
- 8.
Engerman and Sokoloff 1997.
- 9.
These two arguments have been revisited and examined by various authors. An excellent summary can be found in Easterly and Levine 2003.
- 10.
Levine 2005.
- 11.
Spolaore and Wacziarg 2013.
- 12.
Putterman and Weil 2010.
- 13.
Spolaore and Wacziarg 2009.
- 14.
The Europeans transferred some cultural customs that had lasting legacies, even in countries in which they did not have permanent settlements. For example, the tradition of afternoon tea, drinking a hot beverage in the heat of the day, in South Asian countries has always been somewhat of a puzzle to me. My personal feeling is that we South Asians should renounce the practice as a remnant of our British colonial past and adopt lassi (a refreshing drink made from yoghurt which has cooling properties) as our national drink. The trouble is that there are many accoutrements (like samosas and pakoras) that go along with the South Asian tea time that would not pair equally well with lassi. I would imagine that as a society, we would not be willing to give up those accompaniments.
- 15.
Grief 1994.
- 16.
Ibid.
- 17.
Mesoudi et al. 2004.
- 18.
Ibid.
- 19.
Ibid, 3.
- 20.
Ibid, 3.
- 21.
Ibid, 3.
- 22.
The authors provide the example of different hammers in competition with each other for the most effective hammering. I used the example of communication since there are examples of cultures like the Aboriginal Australians who do not have written records because they relied on story-telling and oral histories.
- 23.
Ibid, 5. The authors compare the second mechanism to that by which a pathogen is distributed across a population.
- 24.
Hewlett et al. 2002.
- 25.
Guglielmino et al. 1995.
- 26.
Ibid.
- 27.
Hewlett et al. 2002.
- 28.
Winterhalder 2001.
- 29.
Hames 2001.
- 30.
For example, models of human behavioural ecology predict that polygyny occurs when males have monopoly over resources that are critical to female survival and reproduction. On the other hand polyandry occurs in inhospitable environments such as the Himalayas caused by the scarcity of cultivable land and the high need for labour inputs (Borgerhoff Mulder and Schact 2012, 4).
- 31.
Spolaore and Wacziarg. 2013.
- 32.
Ibid, 362. An example of the importance of ancestry is provided with respect to agriculture. The Neolithic transition to agriculture provided experience that is captured in the historical characteristics of ancestors and is correlated with economic development.
- 33.
White and Burton 1988.
- 34.
Verdon 1983.
- 35.
- 36.
DeMeo 2003.
- 37.
Pryor 1986.
- 38.
Alesina et al. 2013.
- 39.
Putterman 2000.
- 40.
Ibid.
- 41.
Douglas 1997.
- 42.
Levinson and Malone 1980.
- 43.
- 44.
- 45.
Burton and White 1984.
- 46.
Elton 2008.
- 47.
Ibid.
- 48.
Ashraf and Galor 2011b.
- 49.
This explanation of paternal investment theory and its connection to climate is from Vliert et al. 2000.
- 50.
Ibid.
- 51.
Talhelm et al. 2014.
- 52.
See the discussion in the next section on the institutionalisation of these traits.
- 53.
Ibid.
- 54.
A brief synopsis of the results is also available in Khawar 2016.
- 55.
See http://www.worldvaluessurvey.org/ for the World Values Survey and Murdock and White 2006 for the Standard Cross Cultural Sample: online edition.
- 56.
The database is the culmination of an additive process of contributions from hundreds of researchers, starting with Murdock and White 1969. The time period chosen corresponds that for which the earliest high quality ethnographic data is available, making this a data base primarily of preindustrial societies.
- 57.
See Murdock and Provost (1973). This variable was developed by the authors and is part of the SSCS database.
- 58.
Ibid.
- 59.
Note that Murdock and Provost (1973) believe that their set of scales is valid but may not be necessarily useful (they then demonstrate one way that it could be with their brief examination of kinship). They were in particular responding to some ideas from Carniero (1970) who was strongly evolutionary in his thinking and techniques which used scale analysis to rank cultures.
- 60.
Harriss (2003) examines the notion that increased stratification in the form of caste structures has a debilitating effect on economic development, using the case of India as an example.
- 61.
Recall the importance of climate and resources on agriculture and the importance of agriculture on the development of societal traits discussed previously.
- 62.
Recall that ‘tropicar’ is a measure constructed by Gallup et al. 1999. For a complete description of the variables used in this study and corresponding summary statistics please refer to Appendix J.
- 63.
The results can be found in Appendix C, with the reported P-values corresponding to Hubert and White standard errors.
- 64.
Ibid.
- 65.
Heinrich 2014.
- 66.
Ibid. The authors further theorise that these institutions shape the psychologies and brains of future generations as children adapt developmentally to the institutional environment in which they grow up. In particular, their evidence points to the possibility that these cultural psychologies and institutions influence rates of innovation, the formation of new institutions, and even the success of immigrants, exerting a long-lasting influence extending beyond the significance of the ecological causes themselves. They even go so far as to suggest that wheat farming may contribute to explaining the origins of WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich and Democratic) psychology and the Industrial Revolution.
- 67.
Alesnina and Guiliano 2015.
- 68.
- 69.
Grief 1994.
- 70.
The data referred to is that presented in Alesina and Guiliano 2015.
- 71.
Ibid.
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Khawar, M. (2017). Untangling Cultural Evolution and Economic Development. In: The Geography of Underdevelopment. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-55348-5_5
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