Simone Dietrich | University of Essex (original) (raw)
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Papers by Simone Dietrich
Journal of Politics
Foreign aid donors try to make themselves visible as the funders of development projects in order... more Foreign aid donors try to make themselves visible as the funders of development projects in order to improve citizen attitudes abroad. Do target populations receive these political communications in the intended fashion, and does the information succeed in changing attitudes? Despite the widespread use of various mechanisms to communicate information about foreign funding flows, there exists little evidence about their effectiveness. We embed an informational experiment about a U.S.-funded health project in a nationwide survey in Bangladesh. Although we find only limited recognition of the USAID brand, explicit information about U.S. funding slightly improves general perceptions of the United States; it does not, however, change respondent’s opinions on substantive foreign policy issues. We also find, contrary to existing arguments that foreign aid undermines domestic government legitimacy, that the information increases confidence in local authorities. While our results suggest that information about foreign donors can effect attitudinal change, they also suggest that current mechanisms for information transmission might not be sufficient to do so.
The Journal of Politics, 2015
Unravelling the Impact of Foreign Aid, 2013
Abstract Over the past two decades, donors increasingly linked foreign aid to democracy objective... more Abstract Over the past two decades, donors increasingly linked foreign aid to democracy objectives in sub-Saharan Africa. Yet systematic research on this topic typically focuses on how aid influences democratic transitions. This study investigates whether and how ...
European Journal of Development Research, 2015
World Development, 2011
Conventional wisdom suggests that foreign aid is more effective in less corrupt states. Recently,... more Conventional wisdom suggests that foreign aid is more effective in less corrupt states. Recently, however, research is emerging that suggests that this argument may be too broad and that the effect of governance on aid effectiveness is masked by the study of aggregate aid flows. I focus on the public health sector and develop an argument of strategic compliance: corrupt recipient governments have incentives to comply with donor objectives but they will do so in aid sectors, in which compliance is cheap. I use two-step Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) as my primary estimation technique. I find strong and robust evidence for my argument.
International Organization, 2015
In response to corruption and inefficient state institutions in recipient countries, some foreign... more In response to corruption and inefficient state institutions in recipient countries, some foreign aid donors outsource the delivery of aid to non-state development actors. Other donor governments continue to support state management of aid, seeking to strengthen recipient states. These crossdonor differences can be attributed in large measure to different national orientations about the appropriate role of the state in public service delivery. Countries that place a high premium on market-efficiency (e.g. US, UK, Sweden) will outsource aid delivery in poorly governed recipient countries to improve the likelihood that aid reaches the intended beneficiaries of services. In contrast, states whose own political economies emphasize a strong state in service provision (e.g. France, Germany, Japan) continue to support state provision. This argument is borne out by a variety of tests, including statistical analysis of dyadic time-series cross-section aid allocation data and individual-level survey data on a cross-national sample of senior foreign aid officials. To understand different aid policies, one needs to understand the political economies of donors. Arel-Bundock et al 2014. 9 e.g. Breuning 1995 and Van der Veen 2011, respectively. See Fuchs et al 2014 for recent review of the literature. 10 International organizations like the UN increasingly rely on bilateral aid as source of financing, which increases the amount of projects that they implement directly on behalf of donor governments (e.g. Knack 2013a). Bilateral funding of international organizations is distinct from multilateral aid. 11 OECD Creditor Reporting System 2012.
Over the past two decades, donors increasingly link foreign aid to democracy objectives in sub-Sa... more Over the past two decades, donors increasingly link foreign aid to democracy objectives in sub-Saharan Africa. Yet systematic research on this topic typically focuses on how aid influences democratic transitions. This chapter investigates whether and how ...
International Studies Quarterly, 2013
ABSTRACT The conventional wisdom in the literature on aid allocation suggests that donors utilize... more ABSTRACT The conventional wisdom in the literature on aid allocation suggests that donors utilize bilateral aid as a tool to buy influence in the aid-receiving country. Those who conclude that aid is driven by donor self-interest focus on government-to-government aid transfers. However, this approach overlooks important variation in delivery tactics: Bilateral donors frequently provide aid to nonstate actors. This paper argues that donors resort to delivery tactics that increase the likelihood of aid achieving its intended outcome. In poorly governed recipient countries, donors bypass recipient governments and deliver more aid through nonstate actors, all else equal. In recipient countries with higher governance quality, donors engage the government and give more aid through the government-to-government channel. Using OLS and Probit regressions, I find empirical support for this argument. Understanding the determinants of donor delivery tactics has important implications for assessing aid effectiveness.
papers.ssrn.com
... are subject to little or no government scrutiny regarding the distribution of profits. Even w... more ... are subject to little or no government scrutiny regarding the distribution of profits. Even worse, the local NGO sector might face threats by governments trying to shave ... NGOs subject to extensive monitoring (Fafchamps and Owens 2009). ...
Foreign aid donors try to make themselves visible as the funders of development projects in order... more Foreign aid donors try to make themselves visible as the funders of development projects in order to improve
citizen attitudes abroad. Do target populations receive these political communications in the intended fashion,
and do they succeed in changing attitudes? Despite the widespread use of the practice, there exists little evidence
about the effectiveness of this strategy. We embed an informational experiment about a U.S.-funded health
project in a nationwide survey in Bangladesh. Although we find limited recognition of the USAID brand, explicit
information about U.S. funding slightly improves general perceptions of the United States. It does not, however,
change respondent’s opinions on substantive foreign policy issues. We also find, contrary to existing arguments
that foreign aid undermines domestic government legitimacy, that the information increases confidence in local
authorities. These results strengthen our understanding of the efficacy of promoting donor visibility and shed
light on an important debate in the area of governance that assesses the effect of external actors on government
legitimacy.
Forthcoming at Journal of Experimental Political Science
Branding of foreign aid may undermine government legitimacy in developing countries when citizens... more Branding of foreign aid may undermine government legitimacy in developing countries when citizens see social services being provided by external actors. We run a survey experiment on a sample of Indian respondents. All subjects learn about an HIV/AIDS program; treated subjects learn that it was foreign-funded. We find null results that, along with existing results in the literature obtained from observational data, call into question the view that foreign-funded service delivery interferes with the development of a fiscal contract between the state and its citizens.
Journal of Politics
Foreign aid donors try to make themselves visible as the funders of development projects in order... more Foreign aid donors try to make themselves visible as the funders of development projects in order to improve citizen attitudes abroad. Do target populations receive these political communications in the intended fashion, and does the information succeed in changing attitudes? Despite the widespread use of various mechanisms to communicate information about foreign funding flows, there exists little evidence about their effectiveness. We embed an informational experiment about a U.S.-funded health project in a nationwide survey in Bangladesh. Although we find only limited recognition of the USAID brand, explicit information about U.S. funding slightly improves general perceptions of the United States; it does not, however, change respondent’s opinions on substantive foreign policy issues. We also find, contrary to existing arguments that foreign aid undermines domestic government legitimacy, that the information increases confidence in local authorities. While our results suggest that information about foreign donors can effect attitudinal change, they also suggest that current mechanisms for information transmission might not be sufficient to do so.
The Journal of Politics, 2015
Unravelling the Impact of Foreign Aid, 2013
Abstract Over the past two decades, donors increasingly linked foreign aid to democracy objective... more Abstract Over the past two decades, donors increasingly linked foreign aid to democracy objectives in sub-Saharan Africa. Yet systematic research on this topic typically focuses on how aid influences democratic transitions. This study investigates whether and how ...
European Journal of Development Research, 2015
World Development, 2011
Conventional wisdom suggests that foreign aid is more effective in less corrupt states. Recently,... more Conventional wisdom suggests that foreign aid is more effective in less corrupt states. Recently, however, research is emerging that suggests that this argument may be too broad and that the effect of governance on aid effectiveness is masked by the study of aggregate aid flows. I focus on the public health sector and develop an argument of strategic compliance: corrupt recipient governments have incentives to comply with donor objectives but they will do so in aid sectors, in which compliance is cheap. I use two-step Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) as my primary estimation technique. I find strong and robust evidence for my argument.
International Organization, 2015
In response to corruption and inefficient state institutions in recipient countries, some foreign... more In response to corruption and inefficient state institutions in recipient countries, some foreign aid donors outsource the delivery of aid to non-state development actors. Other donor governments continue to support state management of aid, seeking to strengthen recipient states. These crossdonor differences can be attributed in large measure to different national orientations about the appropriate role of the state in public service delivery. Countries that place a high premium on market-efficiency (e.g. US, UK, Sweden) will outsource aid delivery in poorly governed recipient countries to improve the likelihood that aid reaches the intended beneficiaries of services. In contrast, states whose own political economies emphasize a strong state in service provision (e.g. France, Germany, Japan) continue to support state provision. This argument is borne out by a variety of tests, including statistical analysis of dyadic time-series cross-section aid allocation data and individual-level survey data on a cross-national sample of senior foreign aid officials. To understand different aid policies, one needs to understand the political economies of donors. Arel-Bundock et al 2014. 9 e.g. Breuning 1995 and Van der Veen 2011, respectively. See Fuchs et al 2014 for recent review of the literature. 10 International organizations like the UN increasingly rely on bilateral aid as source of financing, which increases the amount of projects that they implement directly on behalf of donor governments (e.g. Knack 2013a). Bilateral funding of international organizations is distinct from multilateral aid. 11 OECD Creditor Reporting System 2012.
Over the past two decades, donors increasingly link foreign aid to democracy objectives in sub-Sa... more Over the past two decades, donors increasingly link foreign aid to democracy objectives in sub-Saharan Africa. Yet systematic research on this topic typically focuses on how aid influences democratic transitions. This chapter investigates whether and how ...
International Studies Quarterly, 2013
ABSTRACT The conventional wisdom in the literature on aid allocation suggests that donors utilize... more ABSTRACT The conventional wisdom in the literature on aid allocation suggests that donors utilize bilateral aid as a tool to buy influence in the aid-receiving country. Those who conclude that aid is driven by donor self-interest focus on government-to-government aid transfers. However, this approach overlooks important variation in delivery tactics: Bilateral donors frequently provide aid to nonstate actors. This paper argues that donors resort to delivery tactics that increase the likelihood of aid achieving its intended outcome. In poorly governed recipient countries, donors bypass recipient governments and deliver more aid through nonstate actors, all else equal. In recipient countries with higher governance quality, donors engage the government and give more aid through the government-to-government channel. Using OLS and Probit regressions, I find empirical support for this argument. Understanding the determinants of donor delivery tactics has important implications for assessing aid effectiveness.
papers.ssrn.com
... are subject to little or no government scrutiny regarding the distribution of profits. Even w... more ... are subject to little or no government scrutiny regarding the distribution of profits. Even worse, the local NGO sector might face threats by governments trying to shave ... NGOs subject to extensive monitoring (Fafchamps and Owens 2009). ...
Foreign aid donors try to make themselves visible as the funders of development projects in order... more Foreign aid donors try to make themselves visible as the funders of development projects in order to improve
citizen attitudes abroad. Do target populations receive these political communications in the intended fashion,
and do they succeed in changing attitudes? Despite the widespread use of the practice, there exists little evidence
about the effectiveness of this strategy. We embed an informational experiment about a U.S.-funded health
project in a nationwide survey in Bangladesh. Although we find limited recognition of the USAID brand, explicit
information about U.S. funding slightly improves general perceptions of the United States. It does not, however,
change respondent’s opinions on substantive foreign policy issues. We also find, contrary to existing arguments
that foreign aid undermines domestic government legitimacy, that the information increases confidence in local
authorities. These results strengthen our understanding of the efficacy of promoting donor visibility and shed
light on an important debate in the area of governance that assesses the effect of external actors on government
legitimacy.
Forthcoming at Journal of Experimental Political Science
Branding of foreign aid may undermine government legitimacy in developing countries when citizens... more Branding of foreign aid may undermine government legitimacy in developing countries when citizens see social services being provided by external actors. We run a survey experiment on a sample of Indian respondents. All subjects learn about an HIV/AIDS program; treated subjects learn that it was foreign-funded. We find null results that, along with existing results in the literature obtained from observational data, call into question the view that foreign-funded service delivery interferes with the development of a fiscal contract between the state and its citizens.