Title: The Power of Information: Evidence from a newspaper campaign to reduce capture
1The Power of Information Evidence from a
newspaper campaign to reduce capture
- Ritva Reinikka
- Development Research Group (DRG)
- The World Bank
- Jakob Svensson
- IIES Stockholm
- University and DRG
2The standard anti-corruption project
- Relies on legal and financial institutions ?
judiciary, police, financial auditors ? for
better policies of accountability - But in many poor countries, these institutions
are weak and among the most corrupt. - few recent examples of successful efforts to
combat corruption and capture in public programs.
3A complementary approach
- Takes the expected users of public services as a
starting point - Rather than increasing accountability from above,
the idea is to enhance client power - That is, to empower citizens to demand certain
standards, monitor and challenge the abuse of
institutions, systems, and officials with whom
they interact in their daily lives
4An unusual policy experiment
- An information campaign in Uganda to reduce local
capture of education funds by empowering schools
(parents) to monitor local officials handling of
a large school-grant program - MOF/MOLG publish monthly transfers of capitation
grants to districts in newspapers - Subsequently notices on actual receipts of funds
posted at all schools - We exploit this policy experiment to study the
effects of increased public access to information
as a tool to reduce capture and corruption
5Public expenditure tracking survey (PETS)
- A public expenditure tracking survey of primary
schools had revealed extensive capture of a
capitation grant intended for schools - on average schools received only 20 of their
entitlements in 1995 (Reinikka and Svensson 2004)
- A repeat PETS in 2001
6Key features of relationship of accountability
7Short and long route of accountability
8Capitation Grant Program
- A national program that prescribes a set amount
of funds to each student. - Local (district) offices used as distribution
channels (opportunity to capture the funds) - PETS compares data of releases of funds (from
central ministry) with school survey data on
receipts
9Effects of increased public access to information
10Effects of increased public access to information
- Problem not able to observe what would happen to
a school in both the state where it is informed
of its entitlements and that where it is not - Problem is compounded by the fact that the
information campaign non-exclusive - Intuitively, schools with access to newspapers
are more extensively exposed to the information
campaign - Treatment group schools having access to at
least one of the main newspapers
11Can the policy changes in the late 1990s explain
the improvement?
- Compare schools pre- and post-campaign
situations, controlling for school-specific
effects like income, quality of the school staff,
school size
12Can the policy changes in the late 1990s explain
the improvement?
13Difference-in-differences estimation
14Newspapers and knowledge
- If newpaper access were a valid proxy of better
access to information, schools with access to
newspapers should be more informed about the
program. - Exploit data on a simple knowledge test of head
teachers to test this prediction.
15Newspapers and knowledge
16Outcome across schools with and without access to
newspapers
- Concern newspaper access endogenous
- control for initial outcomes (including
unobserved school specific fixed effects) - schools do not necessarily buy their own
newspaper - access to newspapers determined by logistical
factors outside the school/community's control - School may be well informed about the program
even if it lacks a newspaper, if parents have one
- Treatment group is not homogeneous
- access to newspapers varies
17Instrument for the exposure to the newspaper
campaign
- Distance to the nearest newspaper outlet.
- Valid instrument?
- must affect the schools exposure to new
information about the grant program but have no
direct effect on the its ability to claim funds
from the district - distance to the nearest newspaper outlet captures
the cost and ease of accessing a newspaper
correlated both with the schools and the
communitys likelihood of being exposed
18Instrumental variable estimation
- Strong relationship between distance to the
nearest newspaper outlet and reduction in capture
since the newspaper campaign started in contrast
to the earlier period - Group effects
- Externalities in learning about the grant program
- Local officials may not be able to distinguish
whether school is informed about its entitlement
19Conclusion
- Provision of mass information, a cheap
intervention, allowed Uganda dramatically to
reduce local capture of a public program aimed at
increasing primary education - Because poor people were less able than others to
claim their entitlement from district officials
before the campaign, but just as likely in 2001,
they benefited most from it. - Several countries have initiated similar
capitation grant programs - Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, Cambodia
- The results suggest that policies to inform and
empower the end-users should be an integral part
of the school grant programs.