Breza, Emily LNunn, Nathan JSeck, Awa Ambra2023-06-0220232023-05-112023-05Seck, Awa Ambra. 2023. Essays in Economic Development and Political Economy. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.30490979https://nrs.harvard.edu/URN-3:HUL.INSTREPOS:37375684This dissertation is comprised of three chapters that study the economic development of modern Africa and the political economy of African American protests in the 60s. In the first chapter I study how social organization shapes patterns of economic interaction and the effects of national policy, focusing on the distinction between age-based and kin-based groups in sub-Saharan Africa. Motivated by ethnographic accounts suggesting that this distinction affects redistribution, I analyze a cash transfer program in Kenya and find that in age-based societies there are consumption spillovers within the age cohort, but not the extended family, while in kin-based societies I find the opposite. Next, I document that social structure shapes the impact of policy by showing that Uganda’s pension program had positive effects on child nutrition only in kin-based societies. In the second chapter I estimate the effect of colonial French military deployment on Moroccan soldiers’ long-term outcomes, as well as on their communities of origin, using historical data on Moroccan soldiers, and exploiting the arbitrary assignment of troops to international locations. Within a municipality, cohorts with a higher share of soldiers deployed to France were more likely to relocate there after independence. In contrast, deployment to other locations did not affect emigration. Furthermore, I find that the effects persist for decades after independence. Furthermore, communities with a higher share of soldiers deployed to France have experienced better economic outcomes and a shift from the agricultural to the service sector. In the third and last chapter I explore whether mass-media affected protests during the American Civil Rights movement and through which mechanisms. I first exploit the exogenous variation in timing of television introduction caused the Federal Communications Commission "freeze" in order to esti- mate the causal effect of TV on protest outbreak. I then complement the analysis with variation in over-the-air signal strength due to topography and climate, as additional source of exogeneity. I find a positive and significant effect of TV on the probability of protest outbreak and on the likelihood that protest is initiated by African Americans. Finally, I extend the analysis disentangling the channels through which television has influenced demonstrations. I find that TV served as a mean to overcome a collective action problem but also that African American role models depicted in TV series are likely to have influenced demonstrators’ ambitions.application/pdfenEconomicsThesis or Dissertation2023-06-020009-0002-7265-4022