Stone Inequality & Social Policy Seminar: Paola Giuliano

Herding, Warfare, and a Culture of Honor: Global Evidence

Paola Giuliano, Chauncey J. Medberry Chair in Management, Professor of Economics, UCLA

Abstract: We examine the importance of norms of revenge and punishment in perpetuating global conflicts. Our analysis leverages the well-known ‘culture of honor’ hypothesis from social psychology, which posits that traditional herding practices generate moral systems conducive to revenge-taking. We find that the descendants of herders (i) experience conflicts that are more frequent and more severe; (ii) are more likely to be involved in conflicts that are motivated by retaliation; and (iii) report a higher emphasis on revenge-taking in surveys. Our evidence suggests that a society’s traditional form of subsistence generated a functional morality that shapes conflict across the globe today. (with co-authors Yiming Cao, Benjamin Enke, Armin Falk, and Nathan Nunn)

Paola Giuliano is a Professor of Economics at the UCLA Anderson School of Management and holds the Chauncey J. Medberry Chair in Management. She is also research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (Cambridge), research affiliate at the Centre for Economic Policy Research (London) and research fellow at the Institute for the Study of Labor (Bonn). Giuliano's main areas of research are culture and economics and political economy. She holds a B.A. from Bocconi University (Milan) and a Ph.D. in economics from the University of California, Berkeley. She received the Young Economic Award from the European Economic Association in 2004. She teaches the Global Macroeconomics and Managerial Economics MBA courses at UCLA Anderson School of Management. Her research has been covered by the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Forbes, Foreign Affairs, Businessweek, Time, The Economist, The Guardian, Financial Times, the Boston Globe, CNBC, KPCC and PBS.

Please note that the location of this seminar has been moved from the Allison Dining Room to Bell Hall. Due to building access restrictions, if you do not have a Harvard ID and wish to attend, you must email inequality@hks.harvard.edu to receive permission.

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