Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/212824 
Year of Publication: 
2015
Series/Report no.: 
BOFIT Discussion Papers No. 14/2015
Publisher: 
Bank of Finland, Institute for Economies in Transition (BOFIT), Helsinki
Abstract: 
Anti-Western conspiracies are frequently used by Governments to strengthen their power. We investigate the impact of conspiracy thinking on expectations of collusion among individuals in Russia and China. For this purpose, we conduct a novel laboratory experiment to measure expectations of collusion and several survey items related to conspiracy thinking. Our survey results indicate that anti-Western conspiracy thinking is widespread in both countries and correlates with distrust. We find a significant effect of anti-Western conspiracy thinking in China: Anti-Western conspiracy thinking correlates with lower expectations of collusion. We explain this result by stronger ingroup feeling emanating from the anti-Western sentiment. Our paper provides a first step in analyzing the economic implications of conspiracy thinking for society.
JEL: 
C91
D83
O17
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
ISBN: 
978-952-323-044-6
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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