Covid-19 crisis and hostility against foreigners

Bartos, Vojtech; Bauer, Michal; Cahlikova, Jana and Chytilova, Julie (2021): Covid-19 crisis and hostility against foreigners. In: European Economic Review, Vol. 137, 103818

Abstract

Harmful behavior against out-group members often rises during periods of economic hardship and health pandemics. Here, we test the widespread concern that the Covid-19 crisis may fuel hostility against people from other nations. Using a controlled money-burning task, we elicited hostile behavior among a nationally representative sample (n = 2,186) in the Czech Republic during the first wave of the pandemic. We provide evidence that exogenously elevating the salience of the Covid-19 crisis increases hostility against foreigners from the EU, USA and Asia. This behavioral response is similar across various demographic sub-groups. Further, we observe zero to small negative effects for both domestic out-groups and in-groups, suggesting that the salience of Covid-19 might negatively affect behavior not only towards foreigners but to other people more generally, though these findings are not conclusive. The results underscore the importance of not inflaming anti-foreigner sentiments and suggest the need to monitor impacts of the crisis on behavior in the social domain.

• Item Type: Journal article
• Faculties: Economics
• Subjects: 300 Social sciences > 330 Economics
• ISSN: 0014-2921
• Language: English