Those Who Stayed: Individualism, Self-Selection and Cultural Change During the Age of Mass Migration

71 Pages Posted: 31 Jan 2019

See all articles by Anne Sofie Beck Knudsen

Anne Sofie Beck Knudsen

Lund University - Department of Economic History

Date Written: January 24, 2019

Abstract

This paper examines the joint evolution of emigration and individualism in Scandinavia during the Age of Mass Migration (1850-1920). A long-standing hypothesis holds that people of a stronger individualistic mindset are more likely to migrate as they suffer lower costs of abandoning existing social networks. Building on this hypothesis, I propose a theory of cultural change where migrant self-selection generates a relative push away from individualism, and towards collectivism, in migrant-sending locations through a combination of initial distributional effects and channels of intergenerational cultural transmission. Due to the interdependent relationship between emigration and individualism, emigration is furthermore associated with cultural convergence across subnational locations. I combine various sources of empirical data, including historical population census records and passenger lists of emigrants, and test the relevant elements of the proposed theory at the individual and subnational.

Keywords: culture, individualism, migration, selection, economic history

JEL Classification: Z10, F22, O15, R23, N33

Suggested Citation

Knudsen, Anne Sofie Beck, Those Who Stayed: Individualism, Self-Selection and Cultural Change During the Age of Mass Migration (January 24, 2019). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3321790 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3321790

Anne Sofie Beck Knudsen (Contact Author)

Lund University - Department of Economic History ( email )

Lund
Sweden

HOME PAGE: http://annesofiebeckknudsen.com

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