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...
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...
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...
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’...
The role of civil society in decentralisation and alleviating poverty - An exploratory case study from Tanzania
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Civil Society, Local Governance and Decentralization, Public Administration, Academic/Think TankIn many developing countries decentralisation efforts have been planned and implemented as a means to improve service delivery to all citizens, to increase citizen participation, and to improve good governance at the sub-national level. However, until recently, poverty reduction has not been a central feature of decentralisation measures until recently. Donors have begun to realise the...
Are International Databases on Corruption Reliable? A Comparison of Expert Opinion Surveys and Household Surveys in Sub-Saharan Africa
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Corruption, Academic/Think TankThis study examines the limits of global corruption indicators based on experts’ perceptions. It draws on a wave of original surveys conducted in eight African countries that combined two types of approaches. The first approach covers a sample of over 35,000 people and uses experience-based questions to measure petty bureaucratic corruption. The second (Mirror Survey) reports...
Social protection in sub-Saharan Africa: Will the green shoots blossom?
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Human Rights, Academic/Think TankThis paper provides an overview of the recent extension of social protection in sub- Saharan Africa. It identifies two main ‘models’ of social protection in the region: the Southern Africa and Middle Africa models. It then assesses the contrasting policy processes behind these models and examines the major challenges they face as regards financing, institutional capacity and...
Transparency Squared: The Effects of Donor Transparency on Recipient Corruption Levels
Africa, Article / Working Paper, Civil Society, Corruption, Academic/Think TankThis paper, prepared for the 2011 meeting of the International Political Economy Society,takes its point of departure in discussions surrounding aid effectiveness. Donors have increasingly demanded lower levels of corruption among their recipients. Development advocacy NGOs and officials in recipient countries have responded by...