IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/unu/wpaper/wp-2025-90.html

Taxation, political engagement, and public goods provision in Colombia's conflict-affected regions

Author

Listed:
  • Sebastián Pantoja-Barrios

Abstract

Citizens in Colombia's conflict-affected regions protest to demand public goods provision while simultaneously producing public goods independently. This is surprising, as both actions are carried out by poor populations and are frequently repressed by violence. What explains when citizens make demands on the state and contribute to local public goods? Drawing on fiscal social contract theory, I argue that these actions are more likely among taxpayers, who perceive greater economic losses than non-taxpayers from the state's underprovision of public goods.

Suggested Citation

  • Sebastián Pantoja-Barrios, 2025. "Taxation, political engagement, and public goods provision in Colombia's conflict-affected regions," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2025-90, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    • Handle: RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2025-90
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.wider.unu.edu/sites/default/files/Publications/Working-paper/PDF/wp2025-90-taxation-political-engagement-public-goods-provision-Colombias-conflict-affected-regions.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Achim Ahrens & Christian B. Hansen & Mark E. Schaffer, 2020. "lassopack: Model selection and prediction with regularized regression in Stata," Stata Journal, StataCorp LLC, vol. 20(1), pages 176-235, March.
    2. Maria Escobar‐Lemmon & Ashley D. Ross, 2014. "Does Decentralization Improve Perceptions of Accountability? Attitudinal Evidence from Colombia," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 58(1), pages 175-188, January.
    3. Juan Albarracín & Juan Pablo Milanese & Inge H. Valencia & Jonas Wolff, 2023. "Local competitive authoritarianism and post-conflict violence. An analysis of the assassination of social leaders in Colombia," International Interactions, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 49(2), pages 237-267, March.
    4. Jonathan L Weigel, 2020. "The Participation Dividend of Taxation: How Citizens in Congo Engage More with the State When it Tries to Tax Them," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 135(4), pages 1849-1903.
    5. Weigel, Jonathan, 2020. "The participation dividend of taxation: how citizens in Congo engage more with the state when it tries to tax them," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 104561, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    6. Valentina A. Bali & Lindon J. Robison & Richard Winder, 2020. "What Motivates People to Vote? The Role of Selfishness, Duty, and Social Motives When Voting," SAGE Open, , vol. 10(4), pages 21582440209, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Denis Cogneau & Yannick Dupraz & Justine Knebelmann & Sandrine Mesplé-Somps, 2021. "Taxation in Africa from Colonial Times to Present Evidence from former French colonies 1900-2018," Working Papers halshs-03420664, HAL.
    2. Alessandro Belmonte & Vincenzo Bove & Jessica Di Salvatore, 2021. "Donors for tax morale: Evidence from 34 African countries," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2021-185, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    3. Blumenstock, Joshua & Callen, Michael & Faikina, Anastasiia & Fiorin, Stefano & Ghani, Tarek, 2023. "Strengthening Fragile States: Evidence from Mobile Salary Payments in Afghanistan," CEPR Discussion Papers 18254, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    4. Cappelen, Alexander W. & Fjeldstad, Odd-Helge & Mmari, Donald & Sjursen, Ingrid Hoem & Tungodden, Bertil, 2021. "Understanding the resource curse: A large-scale experiment on corruption in Tanzania," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 183(C), pages 129-157.
    5. Guillermo Cruces & Dario Tortarolo & Gonzalo Vazquez-Bare, 2023. "Design of partial population experiments with an application to spillovers in tax compliance," IFS Working Papers W23/17, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    6. Okunogbe, Oyebola M. & Tourek,Gabriel, 2023. "How Can Lower-Income Countries Collect More Taxes ? The Role of Technology, Tax Agents, and Politics," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10655, The World Bank.
    7. Leopoldo Fergusson & Carlos A. Molina & James A. Robinson, 2022. "The Weak State Trap," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 89(354), pages 293-331, April.
    8. Tourek, Gabriel, 2022. "Targeting in tax behavior: Evidence from Rwandan firms," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    9. Morelli, Massimo & Bellodi, Luca & Vannoni, Matia, 2021. "The Costs of Populism for the Bureaucracy and Government Performance:," CEPR Discussion Papers 15929, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    10. Cédric Chambru & Emeric Henry & Benjamin Marx, 2024. "The Dynamic Consequences of State Building: Evidence from the French Revolution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 114(11), pages 3578-3622, November.
    11. Prichard, Wilson & Jibao, Samuel & Orgeira Pillai, Nicolas, 2025. "Sub-national property tax reform and tax bargaining: Lessons from a quasi-randomized reform program in Sierra Leone," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 185(C).
    12. Guillermo Cruces & Dario Tortarolo & Gonzalo Vazquez-Bare, 2022. "Design of two-stage experiments with an application to spillovers in tax compliance," IFS Working Papers W22/32, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    13. Alessandro Belmonte & Désirée Teobaldelli & Davide Ticchi, 2023. "Tax morale, fiscal capacity, and war," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 94(2), pages 445-474, June.
    14. Meinzen-Dick, Ruth & Lambrecht, Isabel & Place, Frank & Chigbu, Uchendu Eugene & Monterroso, Iliana & Suhardiman, Diana, 2025. "Expanding tenure horizons in food policy research," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    15. Weigel, Jonathan & Balán, Pablo & Bergeron, Augustin & Tourek, Gabriel, 2020. "Local Elites as State Capacity: How City Chiefs Use Local Information to Increase Tax Compliance in the D.R. Congo," CEPR Discussion Papers 15138, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    16. Luca Bellodi & Massimo Morelli & Matia Vannoni, 2021. "The Costs of Populism for the Bureaucracy and Government Performance: Evidence from Italian Municipalities," BAFFI CAREFIN Working Papers 21158, BAFFI CAREFIN, Centre for Applied Research on International Markets Banking Finance and Regulation, Universita' Bocconi, Milano, Italy.
    17. Raymundo M. Campos-Vazquez & Samuel D. Restrepo-Oyola, 2025. "A randomized intervention to gauge preferred tax rates and progressivity," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 32(3), pages 782-804, June.
    18. Lü, Xiaobo & Tsai, Lily L. & Zhang, Ping & Trinh, Minh, 2025. "Do government accountability and responsiveness enhance support for property taxes? Experimental evidence from China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).
    19. Okunogbe,Oyebola Motunrayo & Santoro,Fabrizio, 2021. "The Promise and Limitations of Information Technology for Tax Mobilization," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9848, The World Bank.
    20. Deininger, Klaus W. & Ali, Daniel Ayalew & Bukin, Eduard & Martyn, Andrii, 2024. "Reforming Land Valuation and Taxation in Ukraine : A Path towards greater Sustainability Fairness, and Transparency," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10998, The World Bank.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:unu:wpaper:wp-2025-90. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: Siméon Rapin (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/widerfi.html .

    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.