Social capital effects of land restitution in Colombia: evidences from field experiments

Abstract: Colombia is ranked second in the world for the number of internally displaced persons (desplazados). In the process towards the end of the internal conflict that has been ongoing since the 1960s, in the 2011, the Government passed a Law to compensate victims, which includes land restitution to displaced households. We run experiments in three different sites: two are rural sites with returning communities and one is an urban neighborhood of public housing to relocate victims. Experimental tasks includes trust game, third party punishment, prisoner’s dilemma and cognitive tests (Raven and Stroop tests). Assessment includes social capital effect of victims’ compensation, softening the impact of poverty and the possibility of ghetto effect in the metropolitan area. We discuss the policy implications for the implementation of the Bill.