Building state and citizenry: A randomized evaluation of a tax-collection campaign in the D.R. Congo

Last registered on May 25, 2020

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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title

Building state and citizenry: A randomized evaluation of a tax-collection campaign in the D.R. Congo

RCT ID

AEARCTR-0001316

Initial registration date

July 23, 2016

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published

July 23, 2016, 6:55 PM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Last updated

May 25, 2020, 7:58 AM EDT

Last updated is the most recent time when changes to the trial's registration were published.

Locations

Country

Congo (Democratic Republic of the)

Region

Africa

Primary Investigator

Name

Jonathan Weigel

Affiliation

LSE

Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

Additional Trial Information

Status

Completed

Start date

2016-03-29

End date

2017-12-22

Keywords

Governance

Additional Keywords

State-building, taxation, corruption

JEL code(s)

H26, D73, P48

Secondary IDs

Abstract

The Provincial Government of Kasai Central, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, is conducting its first citywide on-the-ground property and rental tax collection campaign in the provincial capital, Kananga. The primary intervention randomly assigns certain neighborhoods to receive this new door-to-door tax collection program, aided by tablet computers and handheld thermal receipt printers. Control neighborhoods remain in the existing regime, in which citizens are supposed to go to the tax ministry themselves to pay taxes (and as a result, tax payment is very low). This study attempts to measure the impact of the program on citizen beliefs about the government and citizen efforts to hold the government accountable. In other words, the study exploits random variation in taxes paid to examine the theorized link between taxation and civic engagement. Additionally, two cross-randomized interventions are used to study how to limit bribe taking among tax collectors administering this new program. First, a collector monitoring (“audit”) intervention is randomly assigned among neighborhoods that receive the on-the-ground taxation program. Second, a citizen-empowerment information intervention is randomly assigned among all neighborhoods in the city.

External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation

Weigel, Jonathan. 2020. "Building state and citizenry: A randomized evaluation of a tax-collection campaign in the D.R. Congo." AEA RCT Registry. May 25. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.1316-5.199999999999999

Former Citation

Weigel, Jonathan. 2020. "Building state and citizenry: A randomized evaluation of a tax-collection campaign in the D.R. Congo." AEA RCT Registry. May 25. https://www.socialscienceregistry.org/trials/1316/history/69142

Sponsors & Partners

Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)

The primary intervention randomly assigns certain neighborhoods to receive an on-the-ground property tax collection program, aided by tablet computers and handheld thermal receipt printers. This study will attempt to measure the impact of the program on citizen beliefs about the government and citizen efforts to hold the government accountable. Specifically, the study will exploit random variation in taxes paid to examine the theorized link between taxation and civic engagement. Additionally, two cross-randomized interventions will be used to study how to limit bribe taking among tax collectors administering this new program. First, a collector monitoring (“audit”) intervention will be randomly assigned among neighborhoods that receive the on-the-ground taxation program. Second, a citizen-empowerment information intervention will be randomly assigned among all neighborhoods in the city.

Intervention Start Date

2016-04-18

Intervention End Date

2016-12-30

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)

For the main intervention (random assignment of on-the-ground tax collection), the main outcome variables are as follows:
- Tax receipts and government revenues: measured using official government data.
- Citizen views about the provincial government: measured with survey questions
- Citizen participation with provincial government: measured by attendance at townhall and submission of government evaluations

For the cross-randomized interventions aimed at reducing corruption among tax collectors, outcome variables are as follows:
- Availability of valid receipt: e.g. if a participant has a printed receipt from the program.
- Discrepancies between citizen receipts and official program records: e.g. if a tax collector issues a receipt but does not submit this money to the tax ministry.
- Discrepancies between the amounts citizens report paying and official program data:
- The amount citizens report paying, including bribe amounts less than the official tax.

Primary Outcomes (explanation)

See the analysis plan, as well as further information at jonathanweigel.com

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)

See the analysis plan, as well as further information at jonathanweigel.com

Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

See the analysis plan, as well as further information at jonathanweigel.com

Experimental Design

The information intervention will be administered in randomly selected neighborhoods during a baseline survey conducted before the start of the tax program. Audits will be administered in selected neighborhoods during the roll out of the program, which will take an estimated 6-8 months to complete. Collection of outcomes of the effects on citizens’ expectations of the governments and their efforts to hold it accountable will begin roughly 6 months after program roll out.

Experimental Design Details

See the analysis plan, as well as further information at jonathanweigel.com

Randomization Method

The random assignment of tax collection treatments to polygons will be conducted in Stata using a specified seed.

Randomization Unit

The randomization unit for assigning the tax program, the audit treatment, and the information treatment is the polygon. As noted above polygons are drawn on a satellite map of the city. They follow geographic features that are easily distinguishable from the ground, i.e. streets, ravines, known city administrative boundaries, etc.

Was the treatment clustered?

Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters

The 431 polygons in the city of Kananga.

Sample size: planned number of observations

The midline sample will have nearly 30,000 observations. The endline sample will have nearly 3000 observations.

Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms

The distribution of sub-treatments across clusters (neighborhoods) is shown below. The tax program includes both the Audit and No Audit columns in the below, meaning that 253 of 431 neighborhoods were assigned to the Tax treatment.

"Audit" "No Audit" "Control"
Info 65 62 88
No Info 60 66 90

Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)

See the analysis plan, as well as further information at jonathanweigel.com

Supporting Documents and Materials

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