About Us
The Program on Governance and Local Development (GLD) is a research program based at the University of Gothenburg, originally founded in 2013 at Yale University by Program Director, Professor Ellen Lust. GLD focuses on the local factors driving governance and development. The program is dedicated to international collaboration and scientifically rigorous, policy-relevant research in an effort to promote human welfare globally. Program findings are made available to the international and domestic communities through academic publications, policy briefs, public presentations, and social media, as well as on-the-ground workshops in cooperation with local partners.
Our Mission
“We aim to promote human welfare by conducting scientifically rigorous research across the globe. Our research focuses on answering a fundamental question: why are some communities able to provide secure environments, good education, adequate healthcare, and other factors that encourage human development, while others fail to do so? We engage with communities across the world, develop methodological tools, gather data, undertake analyses on major issues affecting societies today, and disseminate findings to academics, relevant policy-makers, and the communities in which we work.”
The pandemic compromised Jordan’s parliamentary elections
Kristen Kao and Ezra Karmel wrote an article for The Washington Post's Monkey Cage on how the Covid-19 pandemic compromised Jordan's parliamentary elections. They argue that the election was the least democratic one in Jordan's recent history.
The article was translated to Arabic by a local news outlet after an official from the Independent Electoral Commission criticised it. It has caused a discussion in Jordan over what democracy really means.
Find the full article here.
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November 2020: Rapid Urbanization in Ghana, Stereotypes and Covid-19, Call for Working Papers and more
October 2020: New Funding, Covid-19 Impact on Kenya's Urban Poor, Bureaucracy in Turkey, and more
September 2020: Webinar Invitation, Research Findings, Staff Updates, Grants & Internships, and more
August 2020: Covid-19 Project Update, Karen Ferree on African Elections, New Funding, and more
June 2020: GLD-IPOR Webinar, New Project, Podcast Special, New Working Paper, and more
Latest Working Papers
Disease Threat, Stereotypes, and Covid-19: An Early View from Malawi and Zambia
A growing literature documents Covid–19’s health and economic effects. Can Covid–19 also exacerbate identity divisions? Psychologists argue that contagious disease increases threat perception, provoking policing of group boundaries and discrimination against perceived outsiders. We focus here on a mechanism underlying this work, the emergence [...]
The Social Bureaucrat: How Social Proximity among Bureaucrats Affects Local Governance
Most studies that examine subnational variations in public services associate low government performance with a lack of accountability. I instead offer a capacity-based explanation. Specifically, I develop a theory based on bureaucratic efficiency and argue that bureaucratic efficiency increases with social proximity among [...]
Reconceptualising Rebel Rule: The Responsiveness of Rebel Governance in Man, Côte d’Ivoire
This study considers the concept of rebel governance responsiveness by the Forces Nouvelles (FN) in Côte d’Ivoire. Responsiveness refers to the degree to which a government’s political decisions correspond to its citizens’ desires. The concept of responsiveness is vital for assessing regime types and constitutes [...]
Mixed Records, Cognitive Complexity, and Ethnic Voting in African Elections
The preference of African voters for co-ethnic candidates is well documented in studies of African political behavior. However, African voters also seem to value good government performance. When does ethnicity trump performance? We theorize that a citizen’s vote choice depends in part on the cognitive complexity she faces when assessing [...]
Country Reports
LGPI Tunisia: Selected Findings on Health
Tunisia has a very good health-care system compared to most of the Arab world. The healthcare system includes primary-care clinics and health centers, which deal with nearly 60 percent of public-sector medical outpatients, reproductive-health visits, schools, and student-health visits [...]
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LGPI Malawi: Selected Findings on Gender
Malawi’s context raises a number of challenges that the government, traditional leaders, civil society, and the development community are working to address. One area of particular focus is gender equality and women’s empowerment. The LGPI supports this effort by providing [...]
