IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/tpr/restat/v105y2023i2p311-326.html

Skill Versus Voice in Local Development

Author

Listed:
  • Katherine Casey

    (Stanford University and NBER)

  • Rachel Glennerster

    (University of Chicago and NBER)

  • Edward Miguel

    (University of California, Berkeley and NBER)

  • Maarten Voors

    (Wageningen University)

Abstract

Where the state is weak, traditional authorities control the local provision of public goods. These leaders come from an older, less educated generation and often rule in an authoritarian and exclusionary fashion. This means the skills of community members may not be leveraged in policymaking. We experimentally evaluate two solutions to this problem in Sierra Leone: one encourages delegation to higher-skill individuals, and a second fosters broader inclusion in decision making. In a real-world infrastructure grants competition, a public nudge to delegate led to better outcomes than the default of chiefly control, whereas attempts to boost participation were largely ineffective.

Suggested Citation

  • Katherine Casey & Rachel Glennerster & Edward Miguel & Maarten Voors, 2023. "Skill Versus Voice in Local Development," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 105(2), pages 311-326, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:105:y:2023:i:2:p:311-326
    DOI: 10.1162/rest_a_01082
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1162/rest_a_01082
    Download Restriction: Access to PDF is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1162/rest_a_01082?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or

    for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Deininger, Klaus & Xia, Fang & Kilic, Talip & Moylan, Heather, 2021. "Investment impacts of gendered land rights in customary tenure systems: Substantive and methodological insights from Malawi," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 147(C).
    2. Michael Callen & Jonathan L. Weigel & Noam Yuchtman, 2024. "Experiments About Institutions," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 16(1), pages 105-131, August.
    3. Jacob Moscona & Nathan Nunn & James A. Robinson, 2026. "Searching for Fish in Trees (緣木求魚)? Economic Development when Context Matters," Working Papers 2026-27, Becker Friedman Institute for Research In Economics.
    4. Alexandra Avdeenko & Jakob Gärtner & Marc Gillaizeau & Ghida Karbala & Laura Montenbruck & Giulia Montresor & Atika Pasha & Galina Zudenkova, 2025. "The Power of Faith: Effects of an Imam-led Information Campaign on Labor Supply and Social Interactions," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2025_621, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • H41 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Public Goods
    • I25 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Economic Development
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:105:y:2023:i:2:p:311-326. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: The MIT Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://direct.mit.edu/journals .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.