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When NGOs fail: A model of advocacy and services provision in weak democracies

Author

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  • Morales, Joaquin
  • Serfilippi, Elena

Abstract

We develop a theoretical model in which NGOs financed by foreign donors engage in two types of activities in a developing country: service provision and advocacy. In the model, service provision relieves poverty, but these aid resources risk embezzlement by corrupt authorities. Advocacy can encourage the local population to demand more transparency to the authorities, reducing embezzlement at the cost of investing fewer efforts in direct poverty alleviation. We find that in general advocacy will be underprovided because its benefit, improved governance, has the characteristics of a public good. NGOs can remedy to this under-provision by coordinating their actions, but because this coordination threatens the rents of the local authorities, officials will respond to coordination attempts by cracking down on NGOs. Full coordination is therefore undesirable: crackdown of NGOs will be too strong, which reduces service provision and hurts beneficiaries.

Suggested Citation

  • Morales, Joaquin & Serfilippi, Elena, 2017. "When NGOs fail: A model of advocacy and services provision in weak democracies," MPRA Paper 91506, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:91506
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    NGOs; Autocracy; Advocacy; Campaining; Aid Effectiveness; Coordination;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F35 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - Foreign Aid
    • F5 - International Economics - - International Relations, National Security, and International Political Economy
    • L3 - Industrial Organization - - Nonprofit Organizations and Public Enterprise
    • O19 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - International Linkages to Development; Role of International Organizations

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