Who's Turn to Eat? The Political Economy of Roads in Kenya

摘要: By reducing trade costs and promoting economic specialization across regions, transportation infrastructure is a determining factor of growth. Yet, developing countries are characterized by underdevelopment, the general lack funding being often mentioned as main reason for it. Then, even when such investments realized, welfare gains associated to them might be captured political elites that strong enough influence their allocation space. We study this issue investigating economy road placement in Kenya, an African country where politicians said favour individuals from region origin or who share ethnicity. Combining district-level panel data on building with historical ethnicity district birth leaders, we show presidents disproportionately invest those regions dominant. It also seems second most powerful ethnic group cabinet public works minister receive more paved roads. In end, large over period can explained appointments, which denotes massive well-entrenched ethno-favoritism Kenyan politics. JEL classification codes: H41, H54, O12, O55, P16 ∗Robin Burgess, Department Economics STICERD, London School (e-mail: r.burgess@lse.ac.uk). Remi Jedwab, Paris r.c.jedwab@lse.ac.uk). Edward Miguel, Economics, University California, Berkeley NBER (email: emiguel@econ.berkeley.edu). Ameet Morjaria, a.morjaria@lse.ac.uk). Acknowledgements: extremely grateful seminar participants at LSE PSE helpful comments. Rashmi Harimohan, Jaya Kanoria, Anne Mbugua Priya Mukherjee provided excellent research assistance. Michelin (Paris) permission use maps Marie Pailloncy-Ruat Michele Gladieux thank Francis Herbert his assistance patience Royal Geographic Society (London). Lastly, DFID Program Improving Institutions Pro-Poor Growth collection.