A large literature documents persistent impacts of formal historical institutions. However, very little is known about how these institutions interact with ancestral traditions to determine long-term economic and social outcomes. This paper addresses this question by studying the persistent...

In the personal sphere, the Indian women are facing various issues related to marriage, divorce, inheritance, guardianship, adoption and succession as they are the subjects of personal law, which varies from religion to religion and is attached to an individual at birth and applied to the person...

Commerce requires trust, but trust is difficult when one group consistently fears expropriation by another. If men have a comparative advantage at violence and there is little rule-of-law, then unequal bargaining power can lead women to segregate into low-return industries and avoid...