Latest Resources
Education | The Surprisingly Dire Situation of Children's Education in Rural West Africa: Results from the CREO Study in Guinea-Bissau (Comprehensive Review of Education Outcomes)
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Governance and MDG, Academic/Think TankWe conducted a survey covering 20% of villages with 200-1000 population in rural Guinea-Bissau. We interviewed household heads, care-givers of children, and their teachers and schools. We analysed results from 9,947 children, aged 7-17, tested for literacy and numeracy competency. Only 27% of children were able to add two single digits, and just 19% were able to read and comprehend a simple...
Tanzania - Urban local government strengthening program : fiduciary systems assessment
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Local Governance and Decentralization, Inter-Governmental OrganizationIn 2004, Government of Tanzania (GoT) introduced the Local Government Capital Development Grant (LGCDG) as a grant flow to local governments. The LGCDG has evolved into the Local Government Development Grant (LGDG) program with several sub-programs and has become a mainstream performance based fiscal transfer. LGDG started the provision of on-budget funding flow to the local government level...
When is Community-Based Monitoring Effective? Evidence from a Randomized Experiment in Primary Health in Uganda
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Civil SocietyA growing number of experts argue that more emphasis must be placed on strengthening beneficiary control that is, strengthening providers accountability to citizens/clients. This report tests whether social heterogeneity in Uganda can explain why some communities managed to push for better health service delivery while others did not. While there is evidence that such an approach can...
Measuring well-being I different approaches, their implications and an illustration | Development Progress
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Asia and the Pacific, Civil Society, Academic/Think TankThis Project Note examines three methods of measuring progress that allow us to compare the performance of different countries. It argues that the methods we employ to measure progress matter, illustrating the diverse results that are generated in a comparison of performance in East Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. The note summarises how the findings inform the measurement component of ODI’s...
Health systems performance in sub-Saharan Africa: governance, outcome and equity
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Local Governance and Decentralization, Academic/Think TankBackground The literature on health systems focuses largely on the performance of healthcare systems operationalised around indicators such as hospital beds, maternity care and immunisation coverage. A broader definition of health systems however, needs to include the wider determinants of health including, possibly, governance and its relationship to health and health equity. The aim of this...
Internet Use and Democratic Demands: A Multinational, Multilevel Model of Internet Use and Citizen Attitudes About Democracy
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Asia and the Pacific, Media, Academic/Think TankThe success of a democracy depends, in part, on public demand for democratic institutions. How does Internet use shape citizens' preferences for regime type? Combining individual public opinion data from Africa and Asia with country-level indices, we test a multilevel model examining the relationship between Internet penetration, individual Internet use, and citizen demand for...
State legitimacy and famines in Sub-Saharan Africa - Munich Personal RePEc Archive
Africa, Article / Working Paper, DemocracyPolitical Economy of famines mainly focuses on political regimes to understand the role of institutions. In this paper, we investigate a broader concept, state legitimacy, and its role on one specific development outcome, famine management. State legitimacy refers to the political history of a country, meaning the embedding of state and society. Using a database of Sub-Saharan countries observed...
First annual report on corruption trends in Uganda: Using the data tracking mechanism
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Corruption, Academic/Think TankCorruption remains an impediment to development and a barrier to poverty reduction in Uganda and in many other African countries. This study has defined corruption as “abuse of office for private gain” and recent surveys, coupled with nationally produced data, indicate that corruption in Uganda is a problem, both at national and local government levels. The Data...
Positioning civil society post-Polokwane: coming to terms with ANC political leadership changes
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Political Parties, Civil SocietyIn 2007 South Africa’s governing party, the African National Congress (ANC) was overhauled in what was seen as a revolt against the leadership of former Party President Thabo Mbeki. The party’s elective national conference was held in Polokwane and led to significant changes in its top political leadership with Jacob Zuma replacing Thabo Mbeki as Party President...
Are swing voters instruments of democracy or farmers of clientelism? Evidence from Ghana
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Democracy, Electoral Systems, Political Parties, Academic/Think TankThis paper states that is one of the first to systematically address the question of whether strength of ethnic identity, political parties’ campaigns, poverty, or evaluation of clientelism versus collective/public goods, determines who becomes a persuadable voter in Africa. The paper conducts an empirical analysis using a unique data set from a survey conducted ahead of Ghana’...