This article evaluates a body of recent work that uses field and natural experiments to
answer the question of whether informed voters can enforce better governance. A common …

I provide a critical overview of the literature on political decentralization. After reviewing first-
and second-generation theories of federalism, I describe recent empirical studies focusing …

Retrospective voting models assume that offering more information to voters about their
incumbents' performance strengthens electoral accountability. However, it is unclear …

We demonstrate the importance of politician social networks for electoral outcomes. Using
large-scale data on family networks from over 20 million individuals in 15,000 villages in the …

Citizens around the world look to the state for social welfare provision, but often struggle to
access essential services in health, education, and social security. This book investigates …

Throughout the world, voters lack access to information about politicians, government
performance, and public services. Efforts to remedy these informational deficits are …

We investigate a channel through which social capital may improve economic well-being
and the functioning of institutions: political accountability. The main idea is that voters who …

Students in India who cheat on a simple laboratory task are more likely to prefer public
sector jobs. This paper shows that cheating on this task predicts corrupt behavior by civil …

This paper studies the electoral effects of town hall meetings based on programmatic,
nonclientelist platforms. The experiment involves the cooperation of leading candidates in a …

Elections are now common in low‐income societies. However, they are frequently flawed.
We investigate a Nigerian election marred by violence. We designed and conducted a …