A paper by Lucy Martin (Yale)
In sub-Saharan Africa, low taxes co-exist with even lower government accountability, seen in high levels of corruption and low public goods provision. While there are existing theories of why taxation might be linked to better governance, many of the microfoundations of this eff ect remain unclear. I argue that taxation impacts governance by altering the expressive bene fit citizens receive from sanctioning corrupt officials, making those who pay taxes more likely to hold leaders accountable. I provide new cross-national evidence that taxation and corruption are linked; I then formalize the theory and test the proposed mechanism using a set of laboratory-in-the- eld experiments in Uganda. I find evidence that taxation activates a stronger fairness norm, leading citizens to demand more from leaders. This e ffect is strongest among adult, wage-earning men – exactly the group who has the most experience, historically, paying taxes in Uganda. I then propose additional tests, to be carried out in 2013, to strengthen and expand my findings.