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Civil Liberties in Times of Crisis

Author

Listed:
  • Marcella Alsan
  • Luca Braghieri
  • Sarah Eichmeyer
  • Minjeong Joyce Kim
  • Stefanie Stantcheva
  • David Y. Yang
Abstract
Major crises — from terrorist attacks to epidemic outbreaks — bring the trade-off between individual civil liberties and societal well-being into sharp relief. In this paper, we study how willing citizens are to restrict civil liberties to improve public health conditions in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. We design and conduct representative surveys involving approximately 550,000 responses across 15 countries, including China and the United States, during many months of the COVID-19 pandemic, from March 2020 until January 2021. We document significant heterogeneity across countries and demographic groups in willingness to sacrifice rights for public welfare. Citizens disadvantaged by income, education, or race are less willing to sacrifice rights than their more advantaged peers in every country, as are those with prior experience in communist regimes. Leveraging naturally occurring variation as well as experimental approaches, we estimate that a one standard deviation increase in health security concerns increases willingness to sacrifice civil liberties by approximately 68%-83% of the difference between the average Chinese and U.S. citizen. Stated preferences correlate with observed behavior including demand for tracing apps, donations, and petitions.

Suggested Citation

  • Marcella Alsan & Luca Braghieri & Sarah Eichmeyer & Minjeong Joyce Kim & Stefanie Stantcheva & David Y. Yang, 2020. "Civil Liberties in Times of Crisis," NBER Working Papers 27972, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:27972
    Note: EH PE POL
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    As found on the RePEc Biblio, the curated bibliography for Economics:
    1. > Economics of Welfare > Health Economics > Economics of Pandemics > Specific pandemics > Covid-19 > Health > Distancing and Lockdown > Voluntary

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    Cited by:

    1. Yusuke Narita & Ayumi Sudo, 2021. "Curse of Democracy: Evidence from the 21st Century," Papers 2104.07617, arXiv.org, revised Sep 2021.
    2. Borisova, Ekaterina & Ivanov, Denis, 2021. "Covid-19 vaccine efficacy and Russian public support for anti-pandemic measures," BOFIT Discussion Papers 09/2021, Bank of Finland, Institute for Economies in Transition.
    3. Mello, Marco & Moscelli, Giuseppe, 2022. "Voting, contagion and the trade-off between public health and political rights: Quasi-experimental evidence from the Italian 2020 polls," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 200(C), pages 1025-1052.
    4. Ester Faia & Andreas Fuster & Vincenzo Pezone & Basit Zafar, 2024. "Biases in Information Selection and Processing: Survey Evidence from the Pandemic," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 106(3), pages 829-847, May.
    5. Ferragina, Emanuele & Pasqualini, Marta & Ricchi, Ettore & Zola, Andrew, 2021. "Who cares about health and the economy through the Covid-19 pandemic? Longitudinally tracking changes and heterogeneity in people’s perceptions of risks," SocArXiv rv7e3, Center for Open Science.
    6. Besley, Timothy & Dray, Sacha, 2023. "The political economy of lockdown: Does free media matter?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    7. Per L. Bylund & Mark D. Packard, 2021. "Separation of power and expertise: Evidence of the tyranny of experts in Sweden's COVID‐19 responses," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 87(4), pages 1300-1319, April.
    8. Fitzpatrick, Anne & Beg, Sabrin & Derksen, Laura & Karing, Anne & Kerwin, Jason & Lucas, Adrienne M. & Ordaz Reynoso, Natalia & Squires, Munir, 2021. "Health knowledge and non-pharmaceutical interventions during the Covid-19 pandemic in Africa," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 190(C), pages 33-53.
    9. Chatruc,Marisol Rodriguez & Rozo Villarraga,Sandra Viviana, 2022. "Discrimination Toward Migrants During Crises," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10091, The World Bank.
    10. Feldhaus, Christoph & Reinhardt, Lukas & Sutter, Matthias, 2024. "Trump Ante Portas: Political Polarization Undermines Rule-Following Behavior," IZA Discussion Papers 17448, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    11. Chatruc, Marisol Rodríguez & Rozo, Sandra V., 2021. "Attitudes Towards Migrants during Crisis Times," IZA Discussion Papers 14319, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    12. Lichand, Guilherme & Belchior, Carlos Alberto & Leal Neto, Onicio Batista & Cossi, João, 2022. "Association of COVID-19 Incidence and Mortality Rates With School Reopening in Brazil During the COVID-19 Pandemic," OSF Preprints rke36, Center for Open Science.
    13. Tiago Correia & Karen Willis, 2022. "Applying critical realism to the COVID‐19 pandemic to improve management of future public health crises," International Journal of Health Planning and Management, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(2), pages 599-603, March.
    14. Martin Lange & Ole Monscheuer, 2022. "Spreading the disease: Protest in times of pandemics," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(12), pages 2664-2679, December.
    15. Harell, Allison & Lieberman, Evan, 2021. "How information about race-based health disparities affects policy preferences: Evidence from a survey experiment about the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 277(C).
    16. repec:zbw:bofitp:2021_009 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Oliu-Barton, Miquel & Pradelski, Bary S.R., 2021. "Green zoning: An effective policy tool to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 125(8), pages 981-986.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D8 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • P0 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - General

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