Winning Hearts and Minds through Development: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Afghanistan Andrew Beath, Fotini Christia, Ruben Enikolopov

Motivation  Internal conflicts play important role in underdevelopment  more than half of the world affected by civil war in last 50 years  Development aid used as a counterinsurgency tool  both in Iraq and Afghanistan  Limited empirical evidence on aid’s effectiveness in winning over the support of an embattled population.  Recent research has produced conflicting results.  Methodological Challenge: Non-random assignment of aid.

Testing the “Hearts and Minds” Strategy  Randomized field experiment deals with selection bias.  Examine effects both at the interim and final phase.  Examine both perceptions and objective measures.  Providing basic public goods through development projects is considered part of an effective counterinsurgency strategy. H1. Public goods provision improves people’s economic well-being, H2. which leads to improved attitudes towards the government, H3. and in turns reduces the number of people willing to support the insurgency, leading to fewer security incidents.

Preview of Results  Development aid can positively effect economic wellbeing, attitudes toward the government, and security perceptions and conditions.  Timeframe of Implementation and Initial Violence Matter  Effects on economic welfare and attitudes towards the government stronger during program implementation, though still observed almost a year after completion. Effect observed in secure and insecure areas.  Violence goes down during program implementation but the effect diminishes after the flow of resources stops. Effect observed only in areas with low levels of initial violence.

Context: National Solidarity Program (NSP)  NSP is the largest development program in Afghanistan.  Over 32,000 of Afghanistan’s 38,000 villages have received NSP.  Sponsored by international donors and run by the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development.  Implemented by NGOs in two main stages:  Election of Community Development Councils (CDCs) through secret-ballot election  Size of CDC proportional to size of community with equal number of males and females.  Project Selection  $200 per household; max community grant $60,000

Evaluation Covers 10 Districts across 6 Provinces Herat Ghor Daykundi Balkh Baghlan Nangarhar

Similarity of Treatment and Control Villages Create CDCs Treatment Villages (NSP) Select Projects Implement Projects Projects Finished Control Villages (Non-NSP) May – Oct. 2009May-Nov Midline EstimatesEndline Estimates Baseline Survey Aug. – Sep st Follow- Up Survey 2 nd Follow- Up Survey The evaluation estimates impacts by collecting data over four years in 500 villages: 250 NSP (treatment) & 250 non-NSP (control) Structure of Evaluation and Data Collection

Security Events Data  ISAF data on security incidents (almost exclusively IEDs-) with exact location, date and time for the period 01/ /2011.  Look at three different periods  Before the start of the program (Jan 2006 –Sept 2007)  Midline Period (Oct Sept 2009)  Endline Period (Oct Dec 2011)

VariableTreatment Effect Midline Treatment Effect Endline P value for equality of coefficients N Male Respondent Expects Household's Situation to Improve Next Year (0.011)*** [0.012]*** (0.019)* [0.013] ,946 Female Respondent Expects Household Situation to Improve Next Year (0.014)*** [0.024]* (0.010)*** [0.023]* ,017 Summary Measure of Objective Wellbeing (0.015)** [0.023] (0.017) [0.018] ,990 Economic Welfare and Governance Attitudes Summary Measure of Governance Attitudes (0.021)*** [0.043]** (0.018)*** [0.031]* ,982

Perceptions of Security and Security Incidents VariableTreatment Effect Midline Treatment Effect Endline P value for equality of coefficients N Security In and Around Village has improved in Past Two Years (0.013)** [0.022] ** (0.015)*** [0.026]* ,962 Compared to Two Years Ago Teenage Girls feel less Safe when Traveling to School and Socializing (0.016)** [0.011]*** (0.014) (0.020) ,128 Attacks based on ISAF measure (0.041) [0.037]** (0.031) [0.047] ,000 Occurrence of a Security Incident (0.041) [0.029]* (0.037) [0.039] 0.301,000

VariableTreatment Effect Mid*Insecure Treatment Effect Mid* Secure Treatment Effect End* Insecure Treatment Effect End* Secure Male Respondent Expects Household's Situation to Improve Next Year (0.021)*** [0.023]** (0.013)*** [0.012]*** (0.023)* [0.021]** (0.010) [0.021] Female Respondent Expects Household Situation to Improve Next Year (0.024) [0.003]*** (0.015)*** [0.021]*** (0.027)** [0.010]*** (0.013)*** [0.027]* The Role of Initial Level of Insecurity Summary Measure for Objective Wellbeing [0.036] [0.011]*** [0.017]* [0.026] [0.040] [0.039] [0.018]* [0.028] Summary Measure for Governance Attitudes (0.043) [0.031] (0.023)*** [0.048]** (0.037)*** [0.007]*** (0.021)]** [0.035]

VariableTreatment Effect Mid*Insecure Treatment Effect Mid* Secure Treatment Effect End* Insecure Treatment Effect End* Secure Security Around Village has Improved in Past Two Years (0.022) [0.023] (0.016)*** [0.026]** (0.034) [0.015] (0.016)** [0.032] Teenage Girls Feel Less Safe Going to School and Socializing Compared to Two Years Ago (0.033) [0.049] (0.018)** [0.012]*** (0.026) [0.014] (0.028) [0.013]** Attacks based on ISAF measure (0.122) [0.155] (0.033)** [0.028]** (0.105) [0.132] (0.019)* [0.030] Occurrence of a Security Incident (0.164) [0.167] (0.036)** [0.034]*** (0.095) [0.154] (0.042) [0.029] The Role of Initial Level of Insecurity

Conclusion  We find that the provision of development aid to villages can: 1. Positively affect economic welfare of population 2. Improve attitudes towards the government 3. Improve security  But effects are conditional on initial levels of security and timeframe of implementation of development program suggesting that development aid:  Can prevent spread of insurgency in areas with low initial violence, but cannot contain it in areas with notable violence.  Need for continual provision of aid rather than one-shot projects.

Specification We estimate the following OLS regression: where Y tvi is the outcome of interest for household i in village v in the midline (1) or endline (2), so that t ∈ {1,2}; T v is the village treatment dummy, τ t is the dummy for period t, φ pt is the village-pair*period fixed effect. Standard errors clustered at village-cluster level; also account for spatial correlation( Conley, 1999 ).