Merit-based selection of bureaucrats is central to state capacity building, yet rare in developing countries. Most executives instead favor patronage -political discretion- in public employment. This paper proposes and tests an original theory to explain when executives forsake patronage for...

We study whether the effects on registered manufacturing output of dismantling the license raj - a system of central controls regulating entry and production activity in this sector - vary across Indian states with different labor market regulations and different nancial development. To guide...