Historical Persistence

Abstract

This essay reviews the literature on historical persistence in political science and the related social sciences. Historical persistence refers to causal effects that (1) operate over time scales of a decade or more and (2) explain spatial variation in political, economic, or social outcomes.We discuss regional and national coverage, state-of-the-art research designs, analytical and inferential challenges, and mechanisms and theories of persistence, drawing broadly from the contemporary literature in political science and economics.

Keywords: history, causal inference, political science, persistence, long-run effects, path dependence