NES Center for the Study of Diversity and Social Interactions and HSE International Center for the Study of Institutions and Development are happy to invite you to our joint meeting of the Research Seminar on Diversity and Development and HSE Seminar on Political Economy.
Ekaterina Borisova (HSE) and Alexei Zakharov (HSE, MAE'1999) will present the paper “Autocratic Policy and the Accumulation of Pro-social Norms: The Moscow Housing Renovation Program” (joint with Regina Smyth).
Registration: till noon of June 22nd, link to video-conference will be sent up to 5 p.m. (Moscow time).
Abstract:
Relying on original data from a survey of 1600 Muscovites, this paper explores the effect of complex and uncertain housing reform policies on the formation of pro-social norms and patterns of societal coordination. We argue that the demands for social interaction embedded in the structure of top-down policy prompted residents of included buildings to interact with other residents and state officials to understand the program, redress policy shortcomings, monitor policy changes, and organize for a house-level vote to secure benefits. Comparing residents living in buildings included and excluded from the program, we find that these interactions led to changes in pro-social norms and increased coordination to support pro-community actions. Notably, we don’t find the same effect for the interactions created by pension reform, a policy which provides a comparative case. Our findings show the effect of authoritarian policy on societal attitudes and behavior and contribute to theories of short- to medium-term accumulation of societal capacity to resolve collective action problems in response to autocratic policy initiatives.