Ebola and State Legitimacy

TY - JOUR

T1 - Ebola and State Legitimacy

AU - Flückiger, Matthias

AU - Ludwig, Markus

AU - Önder, Ali Sina

PY - 2019/1/8

Y1 - 2019/1/8

N2 - We exploit the West African Ebola epidemic as an event that necessitated the provision of a common-interest public good, Ebola control measures, to empirically investigate the effect of public good provision on state legitimacy. Our results show that state legitimacy, measured by trust in government authorities, increased with exposure to the epidemic. We argue, supported by results from SMS-message-based surveys, that a potentially important channel underlying this finding is a greater valuation of control measures in regions with intense transmission. Evidence further indicates that the effects of Ebola exposure are more pronounced in areas where governments responded relatively robustly to the epidemic.

AB - We exploit the West African Ebola epidemic as an event that necessitated the provision of a common-interest public good, Ebola control measures, to empirically investigate the effect of public good provision on state legitimacy. Our results show that state legitimacy, measured by trust in government authorities, increased with exposure to the epidemic. We argue, supported by results from SMS-message-based surveys, that a potentially important channel underlying this finding is a greater valuation of control measures in regions with intense transmission. Evidence further indicates that the effects of Ebola exposure are more pronounced in areas where governments responded relatively robustly to the epidemic.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85069668499&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1111/ecoj.12638

DO - 10.1111/ecoj.12638

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85069668499

SN - 0013-0133

VL - 129

SP - 2064

EP - 2089

JO - Economic Journal

JF - Economic Journal

IS - 621

ER -