The Long-run Effects of Colonial Investments in Education: Evidence from Missions in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Details

Supervisors

Guirkinger, Catherine

Faculty

Faculté des sciences économiques, sociales, politiques et de communication

Degree label

Master [120] en sciences économiques, orientation générale, à finalité approfondie

Abstract

Do colonial policies have an impact today? How long do investments in education last? I investigate these questions in the context of the DRC. Since missions are usually conceived as one of the most important human capital promoting institutions during the colonial era, providing virtually all primary education in the DRC, I rely on a novel dataset for this country that combines geocoded data about Christian missions from 1879-1960 with DHS-surveys and historical data to study the long-run consequences of past missionary presence on present-day education. I show that, within regions close to a mission, there exists a positive relationship between the presence of historical missions and single years of education, literacy or education achievement. Moreover, these results are driven by female outcomes, which provides useful insights about the gender facet of these colonial institutions.