Crunching the numbers. Responsibly.
We exploit differences in European mortality rates to estimate the effect of institutions on economic performance. Europeans adopted very different colonization policies in different colonies, with different associated institutions. In places where Europeans faced high mortality rates, they could not settle and were more likely to set up extractive institutions. These institutions persisted to the present. Exploiting differences in European mortality rates as an instrument for current institutions, we estimate large effects of institutions on income per capita. Once the effect of institutions is controlled for, countries in Africa or those closer to the equator do not have lower incomes. (JEL O11, P16, P51)
Exploiting differences in European mortality rates as an instrument for current institutions, we estimate large effects of institutions on income per capita.
2SLS estimates are large and robust, but rely on an exclusion restriction
settler mortality alone explains 27 percent of the differences in institutions we observe today.
directly reported first-stage relationship in the main institutions regression
The colonial state and institutions persisted even after independence.
historical evidence and early-to-current institution regressions point in the same direction
Once the effect of institutions is controlled for, countries in Africa or those closer to the equator do not have lower incomes.
continent and latitude controls are insignificant in key IV specifications
none of these overturn our results
additional controls leave the institutional coefficient broadly stable
Derived from the full evaluation — not a separate score.
Strengths
The article turns historical European mortality rates into an instrument for current institutions, directly targeting the endogeneity of institutional quality in income regressions. Table 3 documents that settler mortality predicts current institutions, and Table 4 uses this first stage in the main IV estimates.
↳ Introduction; Table 3; Table 4
The analysis tests whether results survive excluding Neo-Europes, excluding Africa, adding continent dummies, and controlling for colonial identity, legal origin, religion, geography, disease environment, and other factors. These checks directly probe the main alternative interpretations raised by the paper’s own identification strategy.
↳ Table 4; Section V.A
The article explains why latitude and ethnolinguistic fragmentation may violate exclusion restrictions in earlier work, then presents settler mortality as a more historically grounded alternative. This strengthens both the contextual framing and the paper’s methodological contribution.
↳ Introduction, literature discussion
Limitations
The central IV claim depends on settler mortality affecting current income only through institutional development. The article defends this with disease-environment arguments and controls, but it cannot rule out every historical channel correlated with settlement patterns.
↳ Introduction; Section III.A; Section V.A
The instrument applies to countries with relevant European colonial histories and available mortality data. The paper’s own robustness discussion notes that the first-stage relationship is weaker within Africa.
↳ Table 4; footnote 21
The article describes data construction and notes appendix materials available from the authors or working paper version, but it does not provide a persistent data repository or analysis code. This is era-typical but below current open-science expectations.
↳ Table 1 notes; Appendix Table A1 references
The score is driven by a strong and clearly articulated IV design that links historical mortality, settlement, institutional persistence, and current income. Tables 3 and 4 provide the core empirical support, while Section V directly addresses many competing explanations through controls and subsample checks. The paper does not receive a near-perfect craft score because the exclusion restriction remains an assumption and the instrument’s scope is limited to former colonies with usable mortality evidence. Impact potential is high for research agenda-setting and policy diagnosis, but lower for translation because the paper does not specify an implementable institutional reform pathway.
Nabu’s assessment, alongside the field’s view.
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Exemplary4.4
The paper advances a distinctive identification strategy linking European settler mortality to present institutions and income, addressing endogeneity in prior cross-country institutional work. The causal contribution is large, but it remains conditional on the exclusion restriction.
we estimate large effects of institutions on income per capita
The empirical design matches the causal question through a documented first stage, 2SLS estimates, and robustness checks excluding Neo-Europes and Africa and adding continent controls. The main methodological limit is that settler mortality must affect current income only through institutions, an assumption the article defends but cannot directly verify.
The exclusion restriction implied by our instrumental variable regression
The article states its causal chain explicitly and structures the evidence from historical mechanism to OLS estimates, first stage, IV results, and robustness checks. Some strong interpretive statements about Africa and latitude require careful tracking of the IV specifications.
Our theory rests on three premises
The paper positions its contribution against institutional, geographic, legal-origin, colonial-origin, and previous IV literatures. It also acknowledges omitted-variable threats and the impossibility of controlling for all correlated channels.
it is impossible to control for all possible variables
No concerns4 of 4 checks
The article’s abstract, first-stage evidence, IV estimates, and robustness narrative are mutually consistent. No numerical contradiction, statistical impossibility, or methods-results mismatch was identified in the supplied text.
The article describes historical mortality and institutional data sources and notes appendix materials available from the authors or working paper version. No ethics, image-integrity, or conflict concern is apparent for this historical cross-country economics study.
Flags: 1 declared / 5 total
Checks on statistical reporting are in development. Nothing has been assessed for this paper yet.
All 12 cited references resolved to real publications via PubMed, Crossref, or OpenAlex.
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High3.8
The study addresses persistent cross-country income differences, a problem directly relevant to development economists, international organisations, and institutional reform debates. It provides a quantified institutional mechanism rather than a narrow academic correlation.
fundamental causes of the large differences in income per capita
The results are informative for policy prioritisation because they estimate the economic importance of institutional quality across real countries. They do not translate directly into a reform blueprint or implementation sequence.
could, in the long run, lead to as much as a 7-fold increase
The evidence transfers best within former colonies where settler mortality can instrument institutional variation. Generalisation beyond that setting is limited, and the article notes a weaker first-stage relationship within Africa.
the relationship between settler mortality and institutions is weaker within Africa
The paper creates a reusable identification strategy and directly engages prior instruments such as latitude and ethnolinguistic fragmentation. This gives later research a clear empirical benchmark for institutions-and-development debates.
their instruments can plausibly have a direct effect on performance
Lower confidence on Readiness, Generalizability — domain match limited.
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