Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/261225 
Year of Publication: 
2021
Series/Report no.: 
Cardiff Economics Working Papers No. E2021/32
Publisher: 
Cardiff University, Cardiff Business School, Cardiff
Abstract: 
We study the impact of broadband penetration on social capital in the UK. Our empirical strategy exploits a technological feature of the telecommunication infrastructure that generated substantial variation in the quality of Internet access across households. The speed of a domestic connection rapidly decays with the distance of a user's line from the network's node serving the area. Merging information on the topology of the network with geocoded longitudinal data about individual social capital from 1997 to 2017, we show that access to fast Internet caused a significant decline in civic and political engagement. Overall, our results suggest that broadband penetration crowded out several dimensions of social capital.
Subjects: 
ICT
broadband infrastructure
networks
Internet
social capital
civic capital
JEL: 
D91
L82
Z13
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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