How Persistent is Social Capital?

Social capital and other informal institutions are said to be highly persistent, with historical events such as conflict, dictatorship or colonisation having a long-lasting effect. I test this proposition in the case of regions that experienced large-scale population displacements after World War II. As social capital is accumulated through relationships and connections, regions that were repopulated by migrants from a wide range of backgrounds are likely to have little inherited social capital. My analysis suggests that, in contrast, repopulated regions are little different from regions unaffected by population transfers. Hence, contrary to the Putnamesque view, much of the present-day social capital appears to have been formed in recent past rather than attributable to long-term historical legacies.