Historical state and its legacy: another perspective on Dai Viet–Khmer economic division in Vietnam

This article revisits the paper “The Historical State, Local Collective Action, and Economic Development in Vietnam” written by Dell, Lane, and Querubin in 2018. The 2018 paper investigates the role of historical state on long-run economic performance in Vietnam. The authors use a historical border in Vietnam, which was in place following the 1698 event and separated two regions: Dai Viet to the north and Khmer to the south. With distinct institutional characteristics on the two border sides, the historical division is said to lead to persistent differences in economic and social outcomes. This article disputes some aspects of the core assumption in their analysis, including the shape and dynamics of the 1698 border, and replicates the statistical outcomes. Results suggest that historical state plays little to no role in determining the social and economic differences among the observations.