Neighborly social pressure and collective action: Evidence from a field experiment in Tunisia

Abstract

Research on political participation almost unanimously assumes that social pressure by neighbors induces collective behavior. Yet most experimental studies focus on individually based forms of political and civic behavior, such as voting and recycling, in Western industrialized societies. The paper tests the effect of neighborly social pressure on collective action in Tunisia. In a field experiment, I manipulate whether neighbors or community outsiders invite citizens to contribute to a public good (i.e., trash collection). I run the experiment in three neighborhoods of varying socioeconomic composition in Tunis (n = 1199). I do not find evidence to suggest that neighborly social pressure encourages participation in neighborhood cleanups, with low participation rates both for the neighbor and outsider contact conditions. While the effect of social pressure does not significantly vary across communities, overall participation rates do. Residents of the poor neighborhood are most likely to respond in a socially desirable way when asked about their intentions but least likely to participate. The paper also discusses some limitations of the study and outlines avenues for future research.