MASELLA, Paolo

Max Weber Fellow, 2007-2008, 2008-2009

From September 2009:

Research Fellow
University of Mannheim
Germany

Email: pmasella@mail.uni-mannheim.de   
  

 

 

 

I completed my undergraduate studies in Pisa, at the Economics department. Then I got a Master degree in Economics at UPF (Barcelona) and now I am about to complete my Ph.D. in Economics at LSE.

I work on identity (not my identity, even if I should) and I focus on two particular types of identity, the national and the ethnic identity. I am trying to study both the determinants of the individual identity and how identity affects the individual behaviour.

I studied the relationship between identity and the degree of ethnic diversity of a country and more recently, in a series of papers with my friends/co-authors, Irma Clots and Oriol Aspachs, I try to understand the extent to which identity can be shifted by policies and regulations. Using survey data from Catalonia, we estimate the impact on identity and political behaviour of the 1983 educational reform whereby the education system became bilingual, and Catalan, together with Spanish, was taught at schools. We try to build a coherent picture in which the reform influences preferences (identity) and, through preferences, individual choices (turnout and party choice).