Central Data Catalog
Citation Information
Type | Journal Article |
Title | The long term effects of the printing press in Sub Saharan Africa |
Author(s) | |
Publication (Day/Month/Year) | 2013 |
Page numbers | 1-49 |
URL | http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-00844446/ |
Abstract | This article delves into the relationship between newspaper readership and civic attitudes, and its e?ect on economic development. To this end, we investigate the long-term consequences of the introduction of the printing press in the 19th century. In sub-Saharan Africa, Protestant missionaries were the first both to import the printing press technology and to allow the indigenous population to use it. We build a new geocoded dataset locating Protestant missions in 1903. This dataset includes, for each mission station, the geographic location and its characteristics, as well as the educational and health-related investments undertaken by the mission. We show that, within regions located close to missions, proximity to a printing press significantly increases newspaper readership today. We also document a strong association between proximity to a printing press and contemporary economic development. Our results are robust to a variety of identification strategies. |
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Cage, Julia, and Valeria Rueda. "The long term effects of the printing press in Sub Saharan Africa." (2013).