Identity-Based Policies and Identity Manipulation: Evidence from Colonial Punjab

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Cassan, Guilhem
• 署名单位: University of Namur
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL-ECONOMIC POLICY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1945-7731
• DOI: 10.1257/pol.20130290
• 发表日期: 2015
• 页码: 103-131
• 关键词: politics

摘要

I study identity-marker based policies and demonstrate the existence of identity manipulation. I analyze the impact of the Punjab Alienation of Land Act (1901), a caste-based legislation, on identity manipulation. Using data from the colonial census, I show that a movement of identity manipulation took place in response to the law. I estimate that in 20 years, 7.5 percent of the population that had an incentive to do so manipulated its identity. I then use an accounting exercise to estimate that the amount of mistargeting caused by this manipulation is between 3.9 percent and 8.2 percent of the land distributed.