Spatial analysis of bureaucrats’ attempts to resist political capture in a developing democracy: The distribution of solar panels in Ghana

• Published in: Political geography 2020-01, Vol.76, p.102087, Article 102087
• Main Authors: Brass, Jennifer N., Schon, Justin, Baldwin, Elizabeth, MacLean, Lauren M.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Bureaucrats; Civil servants; Civil service; Democracy; Distributive politics; Districts; Electricity; Geographically weighted regression (GWR); Government employees; Logistics; Panel data; Patronage; Political capture; Politicians; Politics; Public goods; Spatial analysis; Voter behavior; Voter mobilization; Voter turnout; Voting
• ISSN: 0962-6298; 1873-5096
• DOI: 10.1016/j.polgeo.2019.102087

Can civil servants in a developing democracy successfully resist political capture in the distribution of public goods? Existing research tends to highlight political patronage logics of distribution, and scholarship focuses primarily on politicians’ motivations. But service decisions are often made by bureaucrats, who sometimes explicitly try to avoid capture and allocate on the basis of need. Using qualitative interviews and spatial regressions with geo-coded data from a solar panel program in Ghana, we examine such a situation. We show that, despite considerable efforts to thwart it, national-level civil servants were unable to fully resist political capture. While solar panel distribution partially corresponded to need for electricity, we find that panels also went to areas where voter turnout was historically inconsistent, likely to motivate voter turnout. The direction of these relationships was consistent across subnational space, but the magnitudes varied considerably and were strongest in districts adjacent to Lake Volta. Qualitative data analysis reveals that this subnational variation reflects the logistics of space and the historical politics of place. The article contributes to theories of distributive politics and of voting behavior, and highlights the need for subnational disaggregation across space. •Civil servants can't fully resist political capture of public goods distribution.•Public goods distribution may be used to mobilize people who do not always vote.•Solar panels were given to areas unlikely to get the electric grid in the medium term.•Ghana tends to place solar panels where there is low road density.•Spatial analysis tools help unpack the politics of place and logistics of space.