Governments do not have perfect information regarding constituent priorities and needs. This lack of knowledge opens the door for groups to lobby in order to affect the government’s taxation levels. We examine the political economy of decentralized revenue-raising authority in light of social...

The paper investigates whether multi-party coalition government is better for the protection of socially backward classes, i.e. Scheduled Castes, in India. We have looked at the impact of types of government on the reduction of the gap between Scheduled Castes and Upper Castes in terms of...

The reduction of poverty, and more recently inequality, are pressing concerns in many low- and middle-income countries, not in the least as a result of the Sustainable Development Goals committing countries to significant improvements by 2030. Redistribution is important for reaching these...

Having a birth certificate is a stepping stone to acquiring an array of rights and benefits, including other documents necessary to navigate in and outside of one's home country. Despite its importance, many children in the developing world never obtain a birth certificate. Whether one does so...

This policy paper summarizes four corridor studies on bilateral social security agreements (BSSAs) between four EU Member and two non-Member States, draws conclusions on their results, and offers recommendations. BSSAs between migrant-sending and migrant-receiving countries are seen as the most...

This paper presents an analysis of the recent evolution of social assistance in the developing world, looking at its complex typological configuration, which has interlinked with, and partly reflects the complex demographic and epidemiological transitions and rapid urbanization and economic...

This paper studies how household-level receipts of cash transfers affect political attitudes in Pakistan. The paper exploits the locally exogenous eligibility cut-off of the flagship Benazir Income Support Programme to estimate causal effects. The main results show evidence of improved...

This paper assesses the effects on poverty and inequality of the alternative targeting approaches that Zambia's Social Cash Transfer programme could take as its expansion continues during the period of the country's Seventh National Development Plan (2017-21). It further assesses the domestic...