Under Review
Foreign Aid and the Performance of Bureaucrats (Job Market Paper)
A well-functioning bureaucracy is key to development. While significant work examines the impact of foreign aid on various development outcomes, comparably little work addresses its impact on bureaucracies. And yet, foreign aid impacts the priorities and functioning of bureaucracies across the developing world. I argue that the introduction of aid projects to bureaucracies changes financial and social aspects of work over which bureaucrats hold important preferences. As a result, bureaucrats make trade-offs between government work and aid projects. I examine this argument using survey, experimental, and interview data from nearly 600 bureaucrats across six central government ministries in Uganda. I find that bureaucrats are willing to divert effort away from core government work and towards aid projects as financial incentives on aid projects increase, suggesting that while donors can use financial incentives to boost bureaucratic performance on projects, they may simultaneously undermine bureaucratic capacity more generally.
The Effect of Government Intervention on the Operational Decisions of NGOs: Evidence from a Survey Experiment in Three Countries
with Simon Hollerbauer, Graeme Robertson, Jeremy Springman, and Erik Wibbels.
Repressive governments seek to influence the behavior of domestic NGOs with both carrots and sticks. How do these efforts shape NGO operations? We identify common actions to influence NGOs: repressive and accomodative interventions in NGO operations, positive and negative rhetoric, and cooptation. Using a survey experiment of 425 NGO directors in Cambodia, Uganda, and Serbia, we investigate how community-level variation in the prevalence of these actions shape NGO preferences over where, how, and with whom they work. As expected, government interventions shape where NGOs prefer to work, raising concerns about how NGO benefits are distributed. Additionally, cooptation isolates NGOs, making them less likely to involve the public in planning or partner with other NGOs. However, moderate repression increases NGO preferences for organizing public action, suggesting NGOs see public mobilization as an effective strategy to resist some forms of repression. Importantly, these results hold across NGOs operating in very different sectors and countries. Panel data from Cambodia documents this finding in self-reported real-world behavior. These findings shed light on how NGOs navigate democratic backsliding.
Work in Progress
Perceptions of Meritocratic Recruitment and Willingness to Pay Taxes
with Diego Romero
Taxes are critical to building state capacity, promoting growth, and sustaining a welfare state. However, many developing countries struggle to ensure tax compliance and shore up tax revenues. In this paper, we will investigate how citizens’ perceptions of meritocratic recruitment and promotion practices in municipal governments affect their willingness to pay taxes. We hypothesize that non-meritocratic practices signal corruption and inefficiency, eroding public trust in government and reducing tax compliance. To test this, we will use survey, survey experimental, and administrative data across 1,500 households, 150 communities, and 30 municipalities in Guatemala. This study will demonstrate how public management practices can affect public trust and the implications for state capacity. We are currently preparing the Pre-Analysis Plan for this study.
Traditional Gender Norms, Clientelism, and Corruption: Survey of African Entrepreneurs
with Diego Romero, Harunobu Saijo, and Ghulam Dastgir Khan
This study investigates how traditional gender norms shape attitudes toward and engagement in clientelism and corruption among entrepreneurs in Africa. While existing research shows mixed findings on gender differences in corrupt and clientelistic behavior, we argue that these differences are fundamentally shaped by underlying patriarchal norms. Using the recently developed Male Dominance Index (MDI), we examine how variation in traditional gender norms across ethnic groups influences gender gaps in corruption and clientelism. Through a survey of 2,000-4,000 entrepreneurs across multiple African countries, combined with conjoint experiments, we test whether higher male dominance is associated with larger gender gaps in corrupt and clientelistic exchanges. We hypothesize that in societies with stronger male dominance norms, women will face higher expectations to engage in corruption while simultaneously experiencing greater social sanctions for such behavior, greater predatory corruption, and lower perceived efficacy of corrupt exchanges. Similarly, we expect higher male dominance to be associated with lower female engagement in clientelistic networks and greater social sanctions for women's clientelistic behavior. This research contributes to our understanding of how cultural gender norms shape informal political and economic exchanges, with implications for female entrepreneurship and political participation in developing economies.
Ongoing Projects
Refugee Perceptions of Resettlement Policy and Local Integration
with Manya Kagan, Guy Grossman, and Ibrahim Kasirye
Funded by: Displaced Livelihoods Initiative
Just 1 percent of displaced people are resettled to the 37 official resettlement countries, meaning many refugees face an uncertain future, and will spend a large part of their lives away from the homes they knew and without the possibility of resettlement. Our study examines refugees’ perceptions of resettlement criteria and how these perceptions affect their willingness to invest in local integration while living in host countries. We use Uganda, Africa’s largest refugee-hosting country, as our empirical case. We are currently undertaking an exploratory study comparing refugee perceptions with actual policies and practices related to resettlement. This involves conducting key informant interviews with officials working in organizations in the refugee resettlement space. In January, we will conduct focus group discussions with refugees living in Uganda to understand their beliefs about resettlement and their efforts at integration. We then plan to seek further funding for a two-stage randomized controlled trial (RCT) testing whether providing accurate resettlement policy information and teaching local language skills improves social and economic integration for refugees.