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Political Economy of Service Delivery: Monitoring Versus Contestation
Author(s) -
Hausken Kjell,
Ncube Mthuli
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
the developing economies
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.305
H-Index - 30
eISSN - 1746-1049
pISSN - 0012-1533
DOI - 10.1111/deve.12035
Subject(s) - politics , civil servants , prestige , balance (ability) , civil service , power (physics) , service (business) , business , political science , public service , political economy , economics , public administration , marketing , law , medicine , philosophy , linguistics , physics , quantum mechanics , physical medicine and rehabilitation
Many communities suffer limited public goods provision due to civil servants (doctors, teachers, etc.) supplementing their low income with moonlighting activities. Monitors of civil servants commonly also earn low salaries from monitoring and may prefer political contestation for power and prestige. We determine an internal equilibrium for how monitors strike a balance between monitoring and political contestation, and a corner solution where an unresourceful monitor does not monitor. Multiple characteristics, including the intensity of political contestation, are accounted for. Survey data from T anzania and S enegal are used to show the significance of poor service delivery within education and healthcare services.