Social Sciences History Seminar

Abstract: This paper examines the economic origins and consequences of religious conflicts during the late Qing China (1860–1911), when Christian missionaries entered a Confucian society. While the literature has attributed Chinese anti-missionary conflicts to the clash of cultures, we find that the religious violence was attenuated by the level of economic complementarities, through access to Treaty Ports and public goods provided by the missionaries. We further document negative economic spillovers of the anti-missionary conflicts, as evidenced by the reduced foreign and domestic investments in modern industries. A key transmission mechanism was Western newspaper coverage, which reinforced collective memory and deterred future investment. We also find long-lasting impacts on modern FDI flows and autarkic attitudes among local Chinese.

Joint with Yujing Huang and Chicheng Ma