The Punjab Model of Proactive Governace

The Punjab Model of Proactive Governace An Early Review of Evidence Michael Callen 1 Ali Hasanain 2 1 UCSD-Economics 2 LUMS-Economics June 29, 2011

The rapid proliferation of Information Communications Technology (ICT) across developing countries is enabling new development innovations Mobile banking (Kenya, Indonesia, and others) Improving epidemiological forecasting and diagnoses (India) Monitoring elections (Afghanistan, Malawi, Uganda) Monitoring infrastructure (Afghanistan) Common features are Exploit dramatic reductions in the cost of communicating Use existing communications infrastructure Rely on citizen-based viral adoption The Punjab Model represents an innovative and promising application of ICT to a critical social problem petty corruption

Why Target Corruption Accountability matters......for service provision: Government responsiveness to floods and food shortages (Besley and Burgess, 2002) Political reservations improve the allocation of public goods (Pande, 2003), (Chattopadhyay and Duflo,2004) Removing obstacles to voting increases hospital visits and reduces low birth weights (Fujiwara, 2010)...and possibly for legitimacy: Widespread abuse of power exacerbate[s] the popular crisis of confidence in the government" (Stanley McChrystal, 2009) Institutional legitimacy is the key to stability" (Robert Zoellick, 2011)

Pre-PM Monitoring Mechanisms Supervisory Officers (i) (ii) Service Facilities Main point of interaction with Citizens Commonly suffers from corruption RHC Prop. Office Citizens

PM Monitoring Mechanisms Supervisory Officers (i) (ii) (iii) Call Center Gathers Pre-call Data Calls citizens Codes data from calls for analysis Call Center (i) (ii) Service Facilities Main point of interaction with Citizens Commonly suffers from corruption RHC Prop. Office Citizens

Predictions from Previous Studies, Theory and Data Theories of corruption (Becker and Stigler, 1974; Rose-Ackermann, 1975) and empirical evidence (Di Tella and Schargrodsky, 2003; Olken, 2007) confirm that increasing the probability that corruption is detected reduces its incidence. The punjab model harnesses the power of ICT in removing information bottlenecks to improve the supervision of government officials.

Novelties of the Punjab Model To our knowledge, PM is the first program to attempt to improve governance and service delivery using ICT

Novelties of the Punjab Model To our knowledge, PM is the first program to attempt to improve governance and service delivery using ICT Focus on Institutional Incentives The career advancement incentives of mid-level officials are aligned with removing corrupt officials, but they need information. Politicians and more senior officials become stakeholders in citizen engagement. They also have actionable information on corruption. This program is incentive compatible" for high-level and mid-level stakeholders. Citizens demand good governance too.

Analysis of Call Data

20% 40% 60% 80% Percent of Total Weekly Transactions 57 60 Figure 1 Invalid and Duplicate Numbers 330 1058 633 1783 2285 2183 2180 2210 547 1715 2439 2582 2315 3029 3509 3749 3620 Jan. 01 Jan. 29 Mar. 18 Apr. 20 May 14 June 4 Weeks of Operation Duplicate Cell Numbers Invalid Numbers

Percent of Total Weekly Transactions 50% 50% 50% 50% Figure 2 Invalid and Duplicate Numbers Bahawalnagar Bahawalpur Faisalabad Gujranwala Gujrat Hafizabad Jhang Khanewal Narowal Rahim Yar Khan Sahiwal Sheikhupura Jan. 01 Mar. 18 May 1Jan. 01 Mar. 18 May 1Jan. 01 Mar. 18 May 1 Sialkot Jan. 01 Mar. 18 May 1 By District Weeks of Operation Duplicate Cell Numbers Invalid Numbers Graphs by District

Hello Glad to see the government waking up. I have only paid official fees. And faced no problem of any type." Thank you for asking all this. They treated us fine, but no medicines were provided. They provided us only prescriptions for drips, injections and tablets to fill out privately" Our registry cost Rs. 1730, but the paralegal charged us Rs. 10,000 for getting this task worth Rs. 1730 done, and kept the rest himself, and bothered us for 2 months. His name is YYY. We have no complaint against government officials"

82 out of 370 respondents were explicitly thankful that the government had undertaken this initiative A total of 161 reported a positive experience at the office being investigated. The 12 messages coded as negative responses include mild criticism of service delivery:

Call Dispositions in the Health Sector Number of Calls 0 100 200 300 400 Citizen Busy 19 20 27 34 Unsuccessful Resp. Ficticious Entry Person Away 82 Wrong Number 92 No Reply 163 Invalid Number Note: Results reflect 1098 calls placed from March 29 June 06 215 Switched Off 431 Successful Call

Citizens Reporting Receiving Medicine Number of Calls 0 200 400 600 800 651 146 162 No Data All Some Note: Results reflect 1098 calls from 05/29 06/06. 447 calls were successful. 124 None

The Views of Calling Center Staff On June 28, we held a focus group with all of the calling center staff to elicit their views on how the Punjab Model was working: Exactly 1/2 indicated a sincere belief that, based on their phone calls, corruption was being reduced. They attested that some calls had developed into candid conversations, which gave them an honest sense. The remaining 1/2 indicated that they believed individuals were being coached in their responses and that nothing had changed. We are beginning a project now to independently assess the extent of corruption using mystery shoppers" with the aim of assessing the impact of the program using a rigorous impact study methodology.