We evaluate the effect of Self Help Group participation on a long term impact parameter, namely asset creation. Indian Self Help Groups (SHGs) are unique in that they are mainly NGO-formed microfinance groups but later funded by commercial banks. The results reveal that longer membership in SHGs...

NGO aid is still widely believed to be superior to official aid (ODA). However, the incentives of NGOs to excel and target aid to the poor and deserving are increasingly disputed. We contribute to the emerging literature on the allocation of NGO aid by performing panel Tobit estimations for...

We develop a model of regulation of service-delivery NGOs, where future grants are conditional on prior spending of some minimal proportion of current revenue on direct project-related expenses. Such regulation induces some NGOs to increase current project spending, but imposes wasteful costs of...

The budgets of development NGOs have risen dramatically over the last decades. In stark contrast to bilateral donors, the geographic choices of NGOs remain virtually unexplored. Using a new dataset and Lorenz curves, this paper shows that NGOs are very active in some countries and hardly active...

Using a new dataset for 41 German non-governmental organizations (NGOs), we analyze the allocation of NGO aid across recipient countries in a Tobit regression framework. By identifying for each NGO the degree of public refinancing, we address the largely unresolved issue of whether financial...

The proliferation of social organizations in China has engendered a lively debate about how to conceptualize these social forces. This paper argues that such a conceptualization should take into account the role that both the party-state and social actors attribute to social organizations. With...

NGOs could help scale up foreign aid efforts by mobilizing private donations. However, fundraising activities do not necessarily result in higher donations, and substitution effects between different sources of revenue may diminish the overall pool of NGOs' resources. This paper examines the...

NGO aid is still widely believed to be superior to official aid (ODA). However, the incentives of NGOs to excel and target aid to the poor and deserving are increasingly disputed. We contribute to the emerging literature on the allocation of NGO aid by performing panel Tobit estimations for...

Amid widespread calls for NGOs to become more accountable and transparent, this work examines the prevalence of discrepancies between what NGOs say and what they do. It does so using a unique dataset of 300 NGOs in Uganda with corresponding beneficiary assessments. Investigating NGO dishonesty...

This study examines survival patterns in a large, representative panel of Ugandan nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) between 2002 and 2008. It finds no evidence that more effective or more altruistic NGOs have a greater likelihood of survival. The main determinant of survival appears to be...