Working Paper: NBER ID: w12911
Authors: Abhijit Banerjee; Lakshmi Iyer; Rohini Somanathan
Abstract: This paper focuses on the relationship between public action and access to public goods. It begins by developing a simple model of collective action which is intended to capture the various mechanisms that are discussed in the theoretical literature on collective action. We argue that several of these intuitive theoretical arguments rely on special additional assumptions that are often not made clear. We then review the empirical work based on the predictions of these models of collective action. While the available evidence is generally consistent with these theories, there is a dearth of quality evidence. Moreover, a large part of the variation in access to public goods seems to have nothing to do with the "bottom-up" forces highlighted in these models and instead reflect more "top-down" interventions. We conclude with a discussion of some of the historical evidence on top-down interventions.
Keywords: public goods; collective action; top-down interventions
JEL Codes: H41; O12
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| collective action (D70) | access to public goods (H40) |
| community characteristics (R23) | collective action (D70) |
| community characteristics (R23) | access to public goods (H40) |
| top-down interventions (D78) | access to public goods (H40) |
| political competition (D72) | access to public goods (H40) |
| larger groups (C92) | freeriding problems (H40) |
| freeriding problems (H40) | success in obtaining public goods (H40) |