Gerda Asmus-Bluhm

Why it matters: Trust across groups is the engine of peace, prosperity, and inclusive governance. History shows that when that trust is broken, nation-building stalls.

🔬 We matched historical detention-camp maps with microdata and leveraged a triple-difference design to trace the long-run effects: violent repression crushed education, wealth, and job prospects, splintering the foundations of a shared national identity.

Bottom line: How independence is achieved may shape a country for decades.

👉 In Kenya, communities exposed to ethnically targeted colonial repression during the Mau Mau uprising are 11 – 13 pp more likely to vote along ethnic lines, albeit rating their co-ethnic incumbent more harshly.

Just shared my latest research with Tobias Korn and @rbluhm.bsky.social on nation-building & identity formation at the #WEHC2025 in beautiful Lund.

Thank you, @juliazimmermann.bsky.social, for organizing a stellar lineup!

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By tracing exposure → rhetoric → action, we’ll learn whether protests harden or temper behavior, and what that means for revolutionary politics more broadly. Stay tuned.

Excited to swap ideas with folks studying collective action, rhetoric, or legislative behavior!

Design: Within-deputy fixed effects separate protest threat from selection.

🔍 Two big questions
1️⃣ Rhetoric: Do nearby protests push deputies toward more radical language or moderation?
2️⃣ Action: Does speech spill into hard-line votes (e.g., the regicide roll-call)?

Day-level shocks: We map every episode of crowd violence, day by day.

Geocoded exposure: Each representative’s home address → precise protest proximity.

Rich outcomes: 50k+ verbatim speeches and roll-call votes in the III. National Convention (including the votes on Louis XVI's fate).

🚩 The project: What happens inside Parliament when the streets erupt?

Street mobilization is everywhere, but solid evidence on its impact inside legislatures is scarce.
Paris during the French Revolution gives us a “natural lab:”

Just shared my latest research re: How do street protests shape what happens inside parliament? at the #WEHC2025 in Lund w/ @rbluhm.bsky.social sky.social , @raphael-franck.bsky.social and Raphael H. Heiberger. More👇

Thank you @enguehard.bsky.social@pmaneuvre.bsky.social for a stellar lineup.

Join us for the European Historical Economics Society (EHES) Conference at the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart, Germany, September 4-6, 2025. Submission is open until February 15 via ehesconference.org