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  • AlfanoGoerlachJAE_Main

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Terrorism and education: Evidence from instrumental variables estimators

Research output: Contribution to Journal/MagazineJournal articlepeer-review

E-pub ahead of print
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<mark>Journal publication date</mark>9/05/2024
<mark>Journal</mark>Journal of Applied Econometrics
Publication StatusE-pub ahead of print
Early online date9/05/24
<mark>Original language</mark>English

Abstract

This paper estimates the effect of exposure to terrorist violence on education. Since terrorists may choose targets endogenously, we construct a set of novel instruments. To that end, we leverage exogenous variation from a local terrorist group's revenues and its affiliation with al-Qaeda. Across several Kenyan datasets, we find that attacks suppress school enrolment more than predicted by difference-in-differences-type estimators. This indicates that terrorists target areas experiencing unobserved, positive shocks. Evidence suggests fears and concerns as mechanisms of impact, rather than educational supply.