Do Local Elections in Non-Democracies Increase Accountability? Evidence from Rural China

Unique survey data is used to study whether the introduction of local elections in China made local leaders more accountable towards local constituents. A simple model is developed to predict the effects on different policies of increasing local leader accountability, taking into account that there is an autocratic upper government. Variation in the timing of the top-down introduction of elections across villages is studied to estimate the causal effects of elections and find that elections affected policy outcomes in a way that is consistent with the predicted effects of increased local leader accountability. [BREAD Working Paper No. 300]. URL:[http://ipl.econ.duke.edu/bread/papers/working/300.pdf].