Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP8869
Authors: Abhijit Banerjee; Raghavendra Chattopadhyay; Esther Duflo; Daniel Keniston; Nina Singh
Abstract: Institutions in developing countries, particularly those inherited from the colonial period, are often thought to be subject to strong inertia. This study presents the results of a unique randomized trial testing whether these institutions can be reformed through incremental administrative change. The police department of the state of Rajasthan, India collaborated with researchers at US and Indian universities to design and implement four interventions to improve police performance and the public?s perception of the police in 162 police stations (covering over one-fifth of the State?s police stations and personnel): (1) placing community observers in police stations; (2) a freeze on transfers of police staff; (3) in-service training to update skills; and (4) weekly duty rotation with a guaranteed day off per week. These reforms were evaluated using data collected through two rounds of surveys including police interviews, decoy visits to police stations, and a large-scale public opinion and crime victimization survey--the first of its kind in India. The results illustrate that two of the reform interventions, the freeze on transfers and the training, improved police effectiveness and public and crime victims? satisfaction. The decoy visits also led to an improvement in police performance. The other reforms showed no robust effects. This may be due to constraints on local implementation: The three successful interventions did not require the sustained cooperation of the communities or the local authorities (the station heads) and they were robustly implemented throughout the project. In contrast, the two unsuccessful interventions, which required local implementation, were not systematically implemented.
Keywords: community participation; crime; india; institutional reform; police; police reform; randomized trial
JEL Codes: H11; H76; K42; O22
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| freeze on transfers of police staff (J45) | improved police effectiveness (H11) |
| freeze on transfers of police staff (J45) | increase in satisfaction among crime victims (K42) |
| freeze on transfers of police staff (J45) | decrease in fear of police (K42) |
| training of police personnel (M53) | significant increase in victim satisfaction with police investigations (K42) |
| decoy visits to police stations (Y50) | improved police performance (H83) |
| community observers and duty rotation (C90) | no robust effects (C90) |