Jade Ponsard*, Aisha Salih**
IBD Amphi
AMU - AMSE
5-9 boulevard Maurice Bourdet
13001 Marseille
Lucie Giorgi : lucie.giorgi[at]univ-amu.fr
Ricardo Guzman : ricardo.guzman[at]univ-amu.fr
Natalia Labrador : natalia.labrador-bernate[at]univ-amu.fr
Nathan Vieira : nathan.vieira[at]univ-amu.fr
*Can collective action drive transformations in social roles and attitudes? I study the effect of local exposure to women’s suffrage protests in the early 20th century in the US on different indicators of gender roles. Enfranchisement was anticipated to enhance women’s awareness, leading to a critical reevaluation of more traditional family structures, according to suffrage movement leaders. This study investigates whether raising awareness about one’s rights, alongside obtaining them, can foster social transformations. I study cross-county marches organized between 1912 and 1914 by the suffragists, a group of women activists fighting for women’s suffrage. I build a novel historical database using local newspaper archives to map the itinerary of the marches. Using individual-level data from US censuses (1880-1930), I compare individual outcomes in towns along the suffragists’ paths with those outside, both before and after the marches, within each county. Results suggest that exposure to suffragist demonstrations led to (i) an increase in the likelihood of reporting being gainfully employed for women and to a decrease in being reported as housekeepers, (ii) a decrease in both marriage and fertility rates. Additionally, preliminary evidence from newspaper coverage suggests that women were likely exposed to suffragist ideas beyond the marches due to the relative growing interest in the topic in treated towns in the subsequent years.
**This paper explores the relationship between climate uncertainty in agrarian economies where formal insurance markets are missing or incomplete and the demand for “spiritual insurance”. We look into the spatial variation of religious participation in Nigeria and whether it can be explained using the underlying climate risk (exposure to climate change) as well as short-term weather shocks. We exploit two main datasets: the World Bank's General Household Panel Survey in Nigeria which includes data on religion, and the Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index which estimates drought probability and severity. We also use the more finely gridded rainfall data from the Climate Hazards Group InfraRed Precipitation with Station data (CHIRPS) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)’s Agro-Ecological Zones (AEZ) modelling framework to estimate spatial and time variations in onset rainy season. This work contributes to the recent literature using quasi-exogenous methods and spatial econometrics to study religion.