The Weak State Trap

Development outcomes come in `clusters' that seem difficult to exit. Using original data from Colombia, we present evidence of the interconnection between two critical political components: state weakness and clientelism. State weakness creates the right environment for clientelism to ourish. Clientelism sets in place a structure of incentives for politicians and citizens that is detrimental to building state capacity. We show that vote buying, as a measure of clientelism, and tax evasion, as a measure of state weakness, are highly correlated at the individual level. We also report evidence that both practices are widely accepted in society, a result consistent with a deeply entrenched relationship of mutually reinforcing in uences. Finally, we propose a set of mechanisms that underlie the hypothesis that a weak state and widespread clientelism are part of a political equilibrium with multiple feedback loops. Our results suggest that state weakness is a trap that is likely hard to exit.

• Autores: Fergusson Talero, Leopoldo; Molina Guerra, Carlos Andrés; Robinson, James A.
• Tipo de recurso: Work document
• Fecha de publicación: 2020
• Institución: Universidad de los Andes
• Repositorio: Séneca: repositorio Uniandes
• Idioma: spa
• OAI Identifier: oai:repositorio.uniandes.edu.co:1992/41137
• Acceso en línea: http://hdl.handle.net/1992/41137
• Palabra clave: State capacity; Tax evasion; Clientelism; Vote buying; Social desirability bias; list experiments; D72, D73, H26, C83, C93
• Rights: openAccess
• License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/