A recent paper of mine available at:

https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.5353328

This study analyzes county level datasets of China to isolate the growth consequences of Confucianism, measuring the prevalence of the worldview with the density of Confucian academies and instrumenting it with the state involvement in academy establishment. IV regressions show that the philosophy discouraged both thrift and ingenuity, which is confirmed by OLS results based on an extensive set of controls. Under Mao’s rule, more Confucian, hence less affluent counties tended to grow and industrialize faster because the state supported them to boost regime stability. Estimated effects, which are empirically consistent and theoretically coherent, accounted for one quarter of the Great Divergence, although the rapid growth of reformist China far surpassed them. 

Keywords: Culture, Confucianism, Growth, China

JEL Classification: N15, N35, O11, O15, O53