Self-Organizing Fire Protection: The Formation of Volunteer Fire Brigades in 19th Century Baden

Title: Self-Organizing Fire Protection: The Formation of Volunteer Fire Brigades in 19th Century Baden

Abstract: We study the emergence of volunteer fire brigades in 19th-century southwest Germany, which provides an interesting case of community-level self-organization for the provision of a local public good. To motivate our empirical analysis, we present a simple collective action model that is subject to multiple equilibria. The model offers several testable predictions concerning the role of local shocks in facilitating collective action. We test these predictions using a panel that covers all 1,577 municipalities in the Grand Duchy of Baden from 1852 until 1889. To estimate the causal effect of local shocks on the probability a fire brigade is established, we apply a local projections approach to difference-in-differences. We find that local fire shocks significantly increased the likelihood a volunteer fire brigade was established but only in municipalities that already had a singing or Turner club in place. Where no such club existed at the time of the fire, the shock had no detectable effect. We also find evidence of geographic spillovers: The founding of a fire brigade in a neighboring municipality had a similar effect to a local fire, again primarily in places where social clubs were already present.