Mounu Prem

Fear to Vote: Explosions, Salience, and Elections

Juan F. Vargas,  Mounu Prem,  Miguel E. Purroy, Felipe Coy, Sergio Perilla

Criminal groups use violence strategically to manipulate the behavior of victims and bystanders. At the same time, violence is a stimulus that causes fear, which […]

How Peace Saves Lives: Evidence from Colombia

Mounu Prem,  Juan F. Vargas,  Sergio Perilla, and Miguel E. Purroy

The victimization of civilians and combatants during internal conflicts causes large socioeconomic costs. Unfortunately, it is not clear whether peace negotiations can significantly reduce this […]

Landmines: The Local Effects of Demining

Mounu Prem,  Juan F. Vargas,  Miguel E. Purroy

Anti-personnel landmines are one of the main causes of civilian victimization in conflict- affected areas and a significant obstacle for post-war reconstruction. Demining campaigns are […]

Police Repression and Protest Behavior: Evidence from Student Protests in Chile

Mounu Prem,  Felipe González

Police repression is a common feature of street protests around the world but evidence about its impact on dissident behavior is limited. We provide an […]

The Peace Baby Boom: Evidence from Colombia’s peace agreement with the FARC

Juan F. Vargas,  Mounu Prem,  Elvira Guerra-Cújar Paul Rodríguez-Lesmes

Violent environments are known to affect household fertility choices, demand for health services and health outcomes of newborns. Using administrative data with a difference-in-differences, we […]

Chile’s Missing Students: Dictatorship, Higher Education and Social Mobility

Mounu Prem,  Maria Angélica Bautista Felipe González Luis R. Martínez Pablo Muñoz

Hostile policies towards higher education are a prominent feature of authoritarian regimes. We study the capture of higher education by the military dictatorship of Augusto […]

The Rise and Persistence of Illegal Crops: Evidence from a Naive Policy Announcement

Mounu Prem,  Juan F. Vargas,  Daniel Mejía

Well-intended policies often have negative unintended consequences if they fail to foresee the different ways in which individuals may respond to the new set of […]

The Human Capital Peace Dividend

Mounu Prem,  Juan F. Vargas,  Olga Namen

While the literature has documented negative effects of conflict on educational outcomes, there is surprisingly very little evidence on the effect of conflict termination on […]

The Geography of Dictatorship and Support for Democracy

Mounu Prem,  María Angélica Bautista Felipe González Luis R. Martínez Pablo Muñoz

We study whether exposure to the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet in Chile (1973-1990) affected political attitudes and behavior, exploiting the plausibly exogenous location of […]

Killing Social Leaders for Territorial Control: The Unintended Consequences of Peace

Mounu Prem,  Juan F. Vargas,  Andrés F. Rivera Dario A. Romero

Incomplete peace agreements may inadvertently increase insecurity if they trigger violent territorial contestation. We study the unintended consequences of the Colombian peace process and find […]

End-of-Conflict Deforestation: Evidence from Colombia’s Peace Agreement

Mounu Prem,  Juan F. Vargas,  Santiago Saavedra

Armed conflict can endanger natural resources through several channels such as direct predation from fighting groups, but it may also help preserve ecosystems by dissuading […]