Working Paper: NBER ID: w25389
Authors: Guo Xu; Marianne Bertrand; Robin Burgess
Abstract: Using exogenous variation in social proximity generated by an allocation rule, we find that bureaucrats assigned to their home states are perceived to be more corrupt and less able to withstand illegitimate political pressure. Despite this, we observe that home officers are more likely to be promoted in the later stages of their careers. To understand this dissonance between performance and promotion we show that incoming Chief Ministers preferentially promote home officers that come from the same home district. Taken together, our results suggest that social proximity hampers bureaucrat performance by facilitating political capture and corruption.
Keywords: bureaucracy; social proximity; performance; corruption; India
JEL Codes: J45; O43
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| social proximity (Z13) | bureaucratic performance (D73) |
| home state allocation (H77) | bureaucratic performance (D73) |
| higher corruption measures in home states (H57) | bureaucratic performance (D73) |
| social proximity (Z13) | political favoritism (D73) |
| political favoritism (D73) | bureaucratic performance (D73) |
| home officers (L84) | political capture (D73) |