 What do brokers provide for urban slums?Mahvish Shami LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library Abstract: Rapid urbanisation in developing countries has often resulted in slums with minimal public goods provision, where the poor rely on clientelist networks to provide for their basic needs. Using household-level data, this paper is the first to empirically document how political clientelism operates in Pakistani slums. It finds that urban brokers, unlike their rural counterparts, are unable to claim credit for public goods provision. Instead, they provide personalised and highly targeted services – such as dispute resolution and assistance with documentation. Moreover, unlike traditional clientelism, urban networks are found to be problem-solving and welfare-enhancing for slum dwellers. Keywords: brokers; clientelism; Pakistan; patronage politics; slums; International Growth Centre; Pakistan Office (project reference CPR-PAK-STA-2013-CPP-37107). (search for similar items in EconPapers) Published in Journal of International Development, 1, July, 2024, 36(5), pp. 2252-2269. ISSN: 0954-1748 Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:122419 Access Statistics for this paper More papers in LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library LSE Library Portugal Street London, WC2A 2HD, U.K.. Contact information at EDIRC. |
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