Patronage, District Creation, and Reform in Uganda

Abstract

The effects of economic and political reforms on patronage in Africa remains unclear. In particular, there is much disagreement about whether structural adjustment programs and democratization have helped to make patronage less pervasive in African politics. Here, I examine the case study of Uganda, which has received much praise for its large-scale economic and political reforms since the late 1980s. However, at the same time, Uganda has also experienced a near-explosion in the number of districts (the highest level of local government), going from 39 to 80 in less than a decade. I examine a variety of potential reasons why these districts might have been created and argue, through the use of both qualitative and quantitative analysis, that district creation has functioned as a source of patronage. Specifically, I show that President Museveni_s government has created new districts as a means to compensate for other patronage resources lost through reforms and that new districts have helped him to continue to win elections. This paper thus constitutes the first rigorous demonstration that the creation of new sub-national political units can constitute a form of patronage and suggests that similar processes may be currently taking place across Africa.

Citizen preferences and public goods: comparing preferences for foreign aid and government programs in Uganda

“…Yet widespread clientelism in Uganda persists, and it has facilitated the single-party government of the National Resistance Movement (NRM) led by President Museveni to retain power for nearly 30 years (van de Walle 2003(van de Walle , 2007Muhumuza 2009;Green 2010;Tripp 2010). As one recent study points out, BIn Uganda, the ruling NRM has established patronage networks throughout the country through the use of local government.…”

New District Creation in Uganda and Local Actors: Passive Recipients or Active Pursuers?

“…Green 2008Green , 2010Awortwi & Helmsing, 2014a) emphasizes that the driving motivations of district creation are situated at the national/regime level because the bottom line incentive relates to the urge to secure the political survival of president Museveni and the National Resistance Movement (NRM). Securing political support can be achieved in two different ways:…”

“…Scholarly research has mainly focused on the role of national actors and factors to explain the multiplication of districts (e.g. Green 2008Green , 2010Niringiye, Bbaale & Olowo, 2013;Awortwi & Helmsing, 2014a, 2014b.…”

“…Most of the district creation studies have pointed at the incentives and interests of the national government -in particular the motivations of the president -in order to explain the proliferation of districts (Kasara, 2006;Green 2008Green , 2010Awortwi & Hemsling, 2014a, 2014b. Less attention has been paid to the role and motivations of local actors in the process of new district creation in Uganda (Grossman & Lewis, 2014), which implicitly suggests that local actors are passive recipients of national level decisions.…”

Tracing Gender Differences in Parliamentary Debates: A Growth Curve Analysis of Ugandan Mps’ Activity Levels in Plenary Sessions, 1998–2008

“…In Uganda, studies have found that the quota policy has been used to bolster the incumbent party (Bauer 2008b;Green 2010;Muriaas and Wang 2012), in this way promoting women who are loyal to the governing party (Goetz 2003;Tripp 2006). The strong ties between the ruling party and quota representatives may further relegate the latter to take positions as subordinate or tokens (Bauer 2008a(Bauer : 362, 2008bGoetz 2003: 118).…”