The political economy of social protection

February 10, 2015

by Sophie King

Africa, Ethiopia, kenya, Rwanda, social protection, Uganda, Zambia

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Phase 1 – the political economy of social protection expansion in Africa

Objectives

This research analyses the political economy of social protection policy formulation and implementation in sub-Saharan Africa, with a view to explaining variation in national experiences.

Cases

Eight countries were selected for in-depth analysis: Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Mozambique, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. These countries also experience a diversity of political settlements, including broad and narrow dominant party, and competitive clientelist systems. Comparative analysis of these countries enables the project to examine the links between variation in the type of political settlement, the orientation of the ruling coalition towards the expansion of social protection, and the ruling coalition’s openness to ideational influence.

Research question

Under what political conditions do elites adopt and promote social protection policies in sub-Saharan Africa and, in particular, how is this shaped by political settlements and transnational ideas?

Methods and research design

The research has three main components:

An historical analysis of each country’s political settlements.
An analysis of social policy and its linkages to national development strategies, the political and economic objectives of these policies, and the dominant social policy ideas that they represent. This analysis will cover both contemporary policy and past approaches.
Process tracing of the policy process, involving key informant interviews with representatives of key government and donor agencies involved in the design of social protection policies.

The first two research activities draw on secondary literature, including a growing body of work on political settlements in several of the case study countries, as well as government and donor policy documents and laws. Where gaps in the existing literature and documentary evidence are identified, these are addressed through key informant interviews with relevant respondents.

The third research activity involves process tracing of debates on the expansion of social protection in the country; this constitutes the main empirical contribution of the project. For this process, tracing, documentary and archival evidence can provide useful inputs. However, key informant interviews are vital to the research objectives.

Phase 2 – the politics of implementing social protection

Cases

The project examines multiple local level case studies within six countries Ethiopia, Bangladesh, Ghana, Kenya, Nepal and Rwanda. Case selection was made to compare dominant party political systems (Ethiopia, Rwanda and, increasingly, Bangladesh) with competitive political systems (Ghana, Kenya and Nepal), as well as comparing different types of programme: social cash transfers (Ghana and Kenya), food and cash-for-work (Ethiopia and Rwanda), school bursaries (Bangladesh and Nepal) and health insurance (Ethiopia, Ghana and Rwanda). Within each country, case selection reflects variation in the history of state formation associated with variation in state capacity, and variation in local politics, including degree of political competition, ruling party legitimacy and popular mobilisation.

Research question

How do variation in state capacity and local political dynamics—including party and popular politics—shape the implementation of social protection?

Methods and research design

The research employed in-depth case studies that traced the formal and informal process of distributing social transfers and enrolment in health insurance through key informant interviews, in-depth interviews, focus groups and a survey.

How does this project fit within ESID’s research agenda?

This research contributes to ESID’s broader objective of identifying the political drivers of inclusive development, with a particular focus on how different political settlements shape developmental forms of elite commitment and state capacity.

Researchers

Role	Name	Location
Lead Researcher	Tom Lavers	University of Manchester, UK
Researcher	Abdul-Gafaru Abdulai	University of Ghana Business School
Researcher	Edward Ampratwum	Ghana Centre for Democratic Development, Ghana
Researcher	Badru Bukenya	Makerere University, Uganda
Researcher	Lars Buur	Roskilde University, Denmark
Researcher	Benjamin Chemouni	London School of Economics, UK
Researcher	Sam Hickey	University of Manchester, UK
Researcher	Naomi Hossain	University of Sussex, UK
Researcher	Mohammed Ibrahim	PhD student, The University of Manchester
Researcher	Thabit Jacob	Roskilde University, Denmark
Researcher	Anna McCord	Consultant, UK
Researcher	Sylvestre Nzahabwanayo	University of Rwanda
Researcher	Rasmus Hundsbæk Pedersen	Danish Institute for International Studies, Denmark
Researcher	Uma Pradhan	University of Oxford, UK
Researcher	Kate Pruce	University of Manchester, UK
Researcher	Indrajit Roy	University of Oxford, UK
Researcher	Hinda Ruton	University of Rwanda
Researcher	Padil Salimo	Roskilde University, Denmark
Researcher	Professor Frederick Wanyama	Maseno University, Kenya
Researcher	Timothy Williams	Boston College, USA

Book

Hickey, S., Lavers, T., Niño-Zarazúa, M., and Seekings, J., eds., (2019) The Politics of Social Protection in Eastern and Southern Africa. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (Open access)