2015
DOI: 10.1257/aer.20131031
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The Value of Democracy: Evidence from Road Building in Kenya

Abstract: Ethnic favoritism refers to a situation where coethnics benefit from patronage and public policy decisions, and thus receive a disproportionate share of public resources, when members of their ethnic group control the government. It has been argued by historians, political scientists, and economists that this phenomenon has hampered the economic performance of many countries, particularly in Africa

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Cited by 459 publications
(237 citation statements)
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References 21 publications
(19 reference statements)
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“…Miguel and Gugerty (2005) argue that all ethnic groups in western Kenya have strong preferences for funding local schools, but that diverse communities have far worse voluntary local fundraising outcomes due to their inability to mobilize to sanction free-riders. Building on the seminal work of Barkan and Chege (1989), Burgess et al (2015) document large-scale distortions in public roads investment in Kenya favoring the president's ethnic group. In their model, this is an equilibrium choice due to the instrumental political benefits for rulers, but it does not rely on any coethnic bias (although they cannot rule out that such bias is playing some role).…”
Section: Introductionmentioning
confidence: 99%
See 1 more Smart Citation
“…Miguel and Gugerty (2005) argue that all ethnic groups in western Kenya have strong preferences for funding local schools, but that diverse communities have far worse voluntary local fundraising outcomes due to their inability to mobilize to sanction free-riders. Building on the seminal work of Barkan and Chege (1989), Burgess et al (2015) document large-scale distortions in public roads investment in Kenya favoring the president's ethnic group. In their model, this is an equilibrium choice due to the instrumental political benefits for rulers, but it does not rely on any coethnic bias (although they cannot rule out that such bias is playing some role).…”
Section: Introductionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Our suggestive findings also provide new insight into the future trajectory of ethnic preferences and identification in Sub-Saharan Africa, given the rapid urbanization taking place in many countries and the growing cross-ethnic interactions that accompany it. Other scholars have pointed to the role that expanding democratization may play in dampening ethnic favoritism (Burgess et al 2015). Gaining a better understanding of the role played by Notes: The dependent variable is the contribution in the Public-Good game (in percent of the endowment).…”
mentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Our suggestive findings also provide new insight into the future trajectory of ethnic preferences and identification in Sub-Saharan Africa, given the rapid urbanization taking place in many countries and the growing cross-ethnic interactions that accompany it. Other scholars have pointed to the role that expanding democratization may play in dampening ethnic favoritism (Burgess et al 2015). Gaining a better understanding of the role played by rapid urbanization, as well as by the major institutional reforms accompanying democracy, will be an important goal for future scholarship on African ethnic divisions.…”
Section: Resultsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Miguel and Gugerty (2005) argue that all ethnic groups in western Kenya have strong preferences for funding local schools, but that diverse communities have far worse voluntary local fundraising outcomes due to their inability to sanction freeriders. Building on the seminal work of Barkan and Chege (1989), Burgess et al (2015) document large-scale distortions in public roads investment in Kenya favoring the president's ethnic group. In their model, this is an equilibrium choice due to the instrumental political benefits for rulers, but it does not rely on any coethnic bias (although they cannot rule out that such bias is playing some role).…”
Section: Introductionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Ethnic favouritism and political clientelism influence the placement of road investments (see Burgess, Jedwab, Miguel, Morjaria, &Padró i Miquel, 2015, andBlimpo et al, 2013). This occurs at the detriment of investment in places where the return could have been greater, or that could have a greater poverty-reduction impact (for example, in light of the 'pro-poor' effect of rural feeder roads, see Jacoby, 2000;van de Walle, 2002).…”
Section: Discussionmentioning
confidence: 99%