Progetto INRES

PI: Prof. Carmine Guerriero

Codice progetto: FIS-2023-03231

CUP J53C24004230001

Origins Project webpage

This project has received financial support from the Italian Ministry of University and Research (MUR) under the initiative: Bando FIS 2 “Procedura competitiva per lo sviluppo delle attività di ricerca fondamentale a valere sul fondo italiano per la scienza 2022 – 2023”.

Project Summary

Albeit the short run effect of negative climate shocks has sadly become evident, their long run institutional impact is still poorly understood. To clarify this issue, I propose to construct and credibly analyze, via an innovative mix of methodologies borrowed from archaeology, history, paleoclimatology, economics, law, and political science, the first comprehensive data set on the institutions developed by the first states recorded over the Bronze Age in Mesopotamia, Egypt, Indus Valley and China to mitigate and adapt to climate change. The key idea underlying my approach is that adverse—but not unbearable—droughts may push elites unable to commit to future transfers to grant strong political and property rights to the non-elites and the latter to favor these reforms by embracing cultural norms assuring a large intrinsic return on cooperation. While strong non-elites' rights convince them that a sufficient part of the returns on investing with the elites will be shared via public good provision, cultural accumulation increases the non-elites' investment payoff allowing them to credibly commit to cooperation despite its limited return. Ultimately, moderate droughts should have shaped the polities part of my sample and observed for each half-century between 3300 and 1750 BCE, directly, via worse production conditions, and indirectly via three key institutional responses. First, inclusive political institutions should have fostered public good provision via a strong state's fiscal capacity. Second, strong non-elites' property rights to land should have favored farming innovations via a secure land tenure. Finally, a forceful culture should have supported farming and long-distance trade investments via a large intrinsic return on cooperation. Instead of simplistically formulating policy-relevant assessments of this past experience, I propose to employ my theory-based empirical approach to understand the institutional responses to climate change of present-day developing countries and, then, extract policy ramifications.

News

Tuesday 13 January 2026

While the direct economic effects of adverse climate shocks are (sadly) evident, their indirect institutional impact is still poorly understood.

Benati and Guerriero show in a paper just published on Economica that, in a panel of 38 most agricultural countries observed over 1960–2018 period, adverse climate shocks push time-inconsistent elites to enact inclusive political institutions and non-elites to embrace strong norms of cooperation.

Shedding light on the impact of climate change on developing countries is one of the key goals of the ORIGINS project.

Find out more here.

Friday 5 December 2025

We are thrilled to announce that on October 1st we have started a new 2.1-million-euro grant (FIS 2023) on "Institutional Resilience to Climate Change" funded by MUR and granted to our director, Carmine Guerriero. Thanks to this generous funding, we have welcomed in Bologna thirteen new colleagues as either postdocs or consultants: Matheus T. Bandeira, Catherine Bishop-Allen, Rory Cheng, Dennys Frenez, Despina Gavresi, Xosé Hermoso-Buxán, Giancarlo Lago, Vincent Morel, Giordano Spiga, Cyril Thomson, Andrea Titolo, Sara Zaia and Siyan Zhou.

Looking forward to an inspiring and productive project ahead!

Working papers

• Institutional Resilience and Cimate Change in the First Stable States.
• Benati, Giacomo, and Carmine Guerriero. "The Origins of (a Culture of) Cooperation."
• Guerriero, Carmine, Amin Gholami, and Alexandre Loktinov. "Climate Change, State-Building and Societal Resilience in Bronze Age Egypt." 
• Guerriero, Carmine, and Yasir Amin. "Climate Shocks and Property Rights to Land."
• Benati, Giacomo, and Carmine Guerriero. "Against Historical Determinism: A Time Inconsistency Theory-Based Approach to the Study of Ancient State-Building."
• Guerriero, Carmine, Amin Gholami, and Yasir Amin. "Endogenous Kinship Institutions."

Upcoming Seminars

Primordial Legal Origins, Seminars by Carmine Guerriero

Tuesday 21 April 2026

Department of Department of Near Eastern Languages & Civilizations, University of Yale

Wednesday 22 April 2026

Department of Economics and Department of Law, Harvard University