Working Group in African Political Economy (WGAPE) January 2017

The Working Group in African Political Economy (WGAPE) brings together faculty and advanced graduate students in Economics and Political Science who combine field research experience in Africa with training in political economy methods. It is co-led by Brian Dillon (Evans School of Public Affairs, University of Washington), Edward Miguel (Department of Economics, UC Berkeley), and Daniel Posner (Department of Political Science, UCLA). We are collaborating with partners at NYU — Abu Dhabi, J. Andrew Harris, Melina Platas Izama and Peter van der Windt to host a special WGAPE meeting with a research discussions component and training module. We look forward to inviting a larger group of African scholars who can benefit from these meeting objectives. Thanks to NYU-AD, WGAPE will be able to provide funding for travel, accommodation, and related expenses to accepted WGAPE participants.

WGAPE meetings are held in four regional sub-groups each fall and in a national meeting each spring. This call for papers is for a special, supplementary WGAPE meeting, which will be held January 6-8, 2016 at New York University – Abu Dhabi.

The meeting will begin on Friday, January 6, and end on Sunday, January 8, 2016. This meeting will expand upon the WGAPE model to include both research discussion sessions on papers in progress, as in previous years (see an archive of papers from past WGAPE meetings), and a short training workshop to expose African/developing country scholars to the newest tools and approaches to conducting rigorous research on political economy of Africa.

1. Our research discussion sessions are built around in-depth discussions of papers that are circulated and expected to be read in advance. Presenters provide little more than a few brief, orienting comments before the floor is opened for discussion. WGAPE is more a forum for presenting work in progress than polished, finished projects and provides an unparalleled opportunity for useful feedback.
2. Our short training workshop from Jan 3-5 will focus on graduate students and junior scholars from low income countries, particularly in Africa. The workshop will cover empirical methods, best research practices, guidance to data sources, research transparency practices, training materials, and networking opportunities. The workshop will be led by Maarten Voors (Wageningen University). New York University, Abu Dhabi

Agenda

January 3-5: EGAP Learning Days

January 6:

Ryan Jablonski, “How Transparency Affects Distributional Politics: A Field Experiment among Elected
Politicians in Malawi”

Elizabeth Carlson, “Honor among Chiefs: An Experiment on Transparency and Leakage in Malawi”

Joan Ricart-Huguet, “Who Governs? Education as Colonial Revenue Maximization”

Jennifer Brass, “Power to the People: The Politics of Electricity Service Provision and Citizenship in Africa”

Michael Seese, “Political Mobilization and the Market for Authority in East Africa”

January 7:

Wayne Sandholtz, “Do voters reward policy? Evidence from a public‐private partnership in education in Liberia”

Andrew Miller, “State versus Syndicate: Civilian Compliance in Lagos’s Contested Territory”

Felix Hartmann, “Getting Ahead Collectively: Using Positive Psychology to Improve Civic Engagement”

Desert Tour

January 8:

Wolfgang Stojetz, “On the Legacies of Wartime Governance”

Manuela Travaglianti, “Civic Education in Violent Elections: Evidence from Côte d’Ivoire’s 2015 Election”

Mathilde Emeriau, “Do anti‐poverty programs sway voters? Experimental evidence from Uganda”

Horacio Larreguy, “A Market Equilibrium Approach to Reduce the Incidence of Vote‐Buying: Evidence from Uganda”