Making Democracy Work: The Effects of Social Capital and Elections on Public Goods in China

This study investigates the extent to which pre-existing social (civic) capital interacts with village elections in determining government provision of local public goods. We collect a unique survey to document the presence of voluntary and social organizations and the history of electoral reforms in China. We exploit the staggered timing in the introduction of elections to estimate the interaction eect of the introduction of village elections and social capital on government-provided public goods. The results show that social capital signicantly enhances the eect of elections. We rule out alternative explanations and provide suggestive evidence for the mechanisms driving our results.