Budget reliability is the first pillar of Public Expenditure and Financial Accountability (PEFA). In this study, we construct an expansion of the PEFA government response accuracy indicator and test its decomposition, with an application to the government budgets and state general accounts of...

While it is recognized that effective state institutions are pivotal for economic development, it is not well understood what their origins are and what explains their cross-country differences. We focus on budget institutions in developing economies, as efficient public finance planning in such...

Does economic standing cross-cut ethnicity in African electoral politics? In many countries in the region, ethnicity appears to be a major consideration in individuals' political decision-making. However, there is significant variation in the extent to which coethnics support parties en bloc;...

Unlike much of the growing literature on political clientelism, this short paper contains mainly the author's general reflections on the broad issues of governance (or mis-governance including corruption), democracy, and state capacity that clientelism has an impact on. It then analyses how its...

At independence in 1975, the Frelimo government took over public administration from the colonial system and started to transform it. The public financial management (PFM) system was adapted to the central planning and management of the economy in line with nationalist and Marxist-Leninist...

The political consequences of economic inequality have been debated in academic and policy circles for centuries. The nature of this relationship seems highly dependent on specific contexts, with empirical studies showing mixed evidence on how economic inequality affects voting and other forms...

Much of the research on fiscal multipliers has used reduced form modelling approaches. While these models have been extended to include richer controls and identification approaches, it remains unclear whether shocks identified capture the true structural shocks. An alternative way to identify...

How do modern fiscal states arise? Perhaps the most dominant explanation, based on the European experience, is that democratic institutions that limited the extractive power of states-exemplified by the 1688 Glorious Revolution in England-paved the way for the rise of fiscal capacity and...

This paper explores the extent to which government revenue is affected by external shocks, and whether these effects are different for resource-rich as compared with non-resource-rich countries. We are particularly interested in the fate of poorer countries, as we assume they will find it more...

Political violence is a worldwide problem that has been on the rise over the past decade. The international dimension of domestic repression and dissent is a particularly relevant factor yet surprisingly understudied. In particular, governments that heavily depend on foreign aid may crack down...