Bilateral trade of films, religion, and democracy (2002–2015).

Some studies have already expressed the importance of cultural traits as key determinants of international trade in cultural goods. However, since a film is a cultural good and an important tool to promote cultural influence by soft power, we investigate whether the lack of democracy and different religions can be viewed as barriers to international trade. Religions, similar to autocracies, do not have good eyes for some types of behaviors that film consumption can instigate. Thus, focusing on conditional correlations between bilateral trade of films, religion, and democracy level, we employ a gravity framework using data between 2002 and 2015. As far as we are aware, this study signifies the pioneering effort to comprehensively examine these potential barriers collectively. Results indicate that democracy levels and different religions are potential barriers to film international trade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]