Power to the People: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment on Community-Based Monitoring in Uganda<sup>*</sup>

Björkman, Martina; Svensson, Jakob

doi:10.1162/qjec.2009.124.2.735

Cited by 606 publications

(628 citation statements)

References 33 publications

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“…58,59 A trial of community-based monitoring of health service provision in Uganda showed a 33% reduction in mortality in children younger than 5 years and a significant 0·14 increase in weight-for-age Z score. 60 …”

Section: The Need To Strengthen Accountabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

The politics of reducing malnutrition: building commitment and accelerating progress

et al. 2013

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In the past 5 years, political discourse about the challenge of undernutrition has increased substantially at national and international levels and has led to stated commitments from many national governments, international organisations, and donors. The Scaling Up Nutrition movement has both driven, and been driven by, this developing momentum. Harmonisation has increased among stakeholders, with regard to their understanding of the main causes of malnutrition and to the various options for addressing it. The main challenges are to enhance and expand the quality and coverage of nutrition-specifi c interventions, and to maximise the nutrition sensitivity of more distal interventions, such as agriculture, social protection, and water and sanitation. But a crucial third level of action exists, which relates to the environments and processes that underpin and shape political and policy processes. We focus on this neglected level. We address several fundamental questions: how can enabling environments and processes be cultivated, sustained, and ultimately translated into results on the ground? How has high-level political momentum been generated? What needs to happen to turn this momentum into results? How can we ensure that high-quality, well-resourced interventions for nutrition are available to those who need them, and that agriculture, social protection, and water and sanitation systems and programmes are proactively reoriented to support nutrition goals? We use a six-cell framework to discuss the ways in which three domains (knowledge and evidence, politics and governance, and capacity and resources) are pivotal to create and sustain political momentum, and to translate momentum into results in high-burden countries.

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Section: The Need To Strengthen Accountabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

The politics of reducing malnutrition: building commitment and accelerating progress

et al. 2013

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“…Although, ideally, the donors should let communities define their own priorities (since this prerogative should belong to them under a genuinely participatory approach), the possibility of elite capture through preference manipulation may, indeed, prompt the donors to take actions aimed at circumscribing it. For example, we know from a spate of recent evidence that better information of the ultimate beneficiaries regarding the nature of the benefits they can expect from an aid programme significantly reduces the risk of aid embezzlement by the elite (Reinikka and Svensson, 2005;Olken, 2007;Banerjee et al, 2008;Bjorkman and Svensson, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Elite capture through information distortion: A theoretical essay

Platteau

Somville

Wahhaj

2014

Journal of Development Economics

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Abstract We investigate donor-beneficiary relationships in participatory development programs, where (i) communities are heterogeneous and dominated by the local elite, (ii) the elite strategically propose a project to the donor, knowing that the latter has imperfect knowledge of the needs of the target population. We analyze how changes in the donor's outside option or information about the needs of the target population affect elite capture. Our central, paradoxical result is that a more attractive outside option, or a higher quality of donor's information may end up encouraging the local elite to propose a project that better matches their own preference rather than the preference of the grassroots. Moreover, in the case where the noise in the donor's information follows a normal distribution, we find that a better outside option generally decreases elite capture but improved information about the needs of the target population is likely to increase elite capture. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor may

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“…Bjorkman and Svensson (2009), in their randomized control trial (RCT) study on community monitoring of health facilities in rural Uganda, observe an absence rate of 47 percent (in the control group that did not receive treatment). A recent report for a study with 104 health facilities in Bushenyi District in Uganda using unannounced visits observes a very similar figure with an average rate of absenteeism of 48 percent (UNHCO 2012).…”

Section: Scope and Consequencesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…24 The study by Bjorkman and Svensson (2009) show how an intervention where communities are activated to monitor and give feedback to health workers can make absenteeism drop by 13 percentage points. Ongoing work also focuses on the power of incentives to reduce absenteeism, which provides another motivation behind recent efforts to move toward results-based financing in the health sector.…”

Section: Explaining Absenteeismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Analyzing the Determinants of Health Worker Performance

Leonard¹,

Mæstad²

2016

Health Labor Market Analyses in Low- And Middle-Income Countries: An Evidence-Based Approach

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Power to the People: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment on Community-Based Monitoring in Uganda^*

Cited by 606 publications

References 33 publications

The politics of reducing malnutrition: building commitment and accelerating progress

The politics of reducing malnutrition: building commitment and accelerating progress

Elite capture through information distortion: A theoretical essay

Analyzing the Determinants of Health Worker Performance

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Power to the People: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment on Community-Based Monitoring in Uganda*

Cited by 606 publications

References 33 publications

The politics of reducing malnutrition: building commitment and accelerating progress

The politics of reducing malnutrition: building commitment and accelerating progress

Elite capture through information distortion: A theoretical essay

Analyzing the Determinants of Health Worker Performance

Contact Info

Product

Resources

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Power to the People: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment on Community-Based Monitoring in Uganda^*