During the European sovereign debt crisis, most countries that ran into fiscal trouble had Catholic majorities, whereas countries with Protestant majorities were able to avoid fiscal problems. Survey data show that, within Germany, views on theeuro differ between Protestants and Non-Protestants,...

During the European sovereign debt crisis, most countries that ran into fiscal trouble had Catholic majorities, whereas countries with Protestant majorities were able to avoid fiscal problems. Survey data show that, within Germany, views on the euro differ between Protestants and...

This paper uses the famous events related to Pussy Riot as a natural experiment to examine the effect of alternative media on church membership. A differences-in-differences strategy is used to explore the effect in question. The hypothesis is that, given a lack of religious background on the...

During the European sovereign debt crisis, most countries that ran into fiscal trouble had Catholic majorities, whereas countries with Protestant majorities were able to avoid fiscal problems. Survey data show that, within Germany, views on the euro differ between Protestants and...

Can media affect religious behavior? We study the effect of a drastic change in media landscape on religious participation in Poland, a country, where vast majority of the population considers itself Catholics. Before 2015, news on mainstream public and private media outlets had a similar...

We examine how exposure to a church-affiliated TV channel affects religiosity and adherence to economic and social behaviors prescribed by the church. Our empirical strategy exploits the expansion of RecordTV, a Brazilian TV channel that started broadcasting religious content over the 1990s. We...

The relationship between state and religion has deep roots in history, being recognized as one of the oldest alliances, or antagonists, known to mankind. Recent evidence suggests that a wall of separation between the two have become widespread. Yet, among our sample of 147 countries, 56 had...

This first cross-country analysis of the causes of corruption in religious organizations provides evidence in support of policy recommendations by Adam Smith. He argued that clergy are best constrained by competition among religious groups. Their appointment and promotion should, however, be...

We investigate why female labour market participation is low in the Arab region. Utilising Akerlof and Kranton's (2000) identity economics approach, we show in a simple gametheoretic framework that women socialised in a traditional family environment violate their identities by taking a job. In...

The belief in occult forces is still deeply rooted in many African societies, regardless of education, religion, and social class of the people concerned. According to many Africans its incidence is even increasing due to social stress and strain caused (among others) by the process of...