2021-22 "Information, Distribution, and the State in Sub-Saharan Africa"

The Stanford King Center on Global Development’s Academic Year Part-Time Research Assistant Program connects King Center faculty affiliates and affiliated researchers with undergraduate and master's students committed to providing research support for up to 15 hours per week during fall, winter, and spring quarters. 

Students have the opportunity to engage in world-class research and have real-world impact. Undergraduate student research assistants earn $17.50 per hour and master's student research assistants earn $25 per hour. Research assistants can work a maximum of 15 hours per week.  Students must be enrolled full-time to participate.  

RESEARCH PROJECT DESCRIPTION:

Developing countries’ inability to evenly administer policy is often thought to be a problem of low state capacity. This project examines how the economically stratified effects of state-building schemes distorts how, and to whom, states administer policy as they develop. It focuses on states’ efforts to solicit information from citizens and how such efforts affect the levels and distribution of state-citizen linkages---such as through the state’s ability to extract from citizens, or through citizens’ abilities to make demands on the state.

Substantively, the project studies a set of reforms initiated by various African governments (Tanzania, Ghana, and Uganda) in the early post-independence era which aimed to register, enumerate, and identify citizens. Such efforts, almost ubiquitous during this era, have been largely forgotten but had long-lasting consequences for welfare: today, half a billion citizens across sub-Saharan Africa possess no state-issued proof of identity.

Research mentor: Jeremy Bowles (Postdoctoral Fellow, Stanford King Center on Global Development) 

WHAT YOU WILL DO:

The research assistant will be involved in the digitization of historical data sources relating to these initial efforts; data entry, cleaning, and merging; descriptive data exercises (including GIS maps); and data analysis. More broadly, they will be involved in the development of research papers on state capacity and African political economy. Those with experience in econometrics and statistics, as well as some interest and knowledge regarding African politics or the political economy of development, are especially encouraged to apply.