Validated Participation Promotes Self-Efficacy and Citizen Engagement in Development

20 Pages Posted: 4 Oct 2017 Last revised: 20 Dec 2021

See all articles by Evan S. Lieberman

Evan S. Lieberman

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Department of Political Science

Yang-Yang Zhou

University of British Columbia, Department of Political Science

Date Written: September 14, 2019

Abstract

Efforts to increase citizen engagement in local governance, particularly in low socio-economic contexts, are frequently ineffective because citizens believe their voices and actions will not be respected by relevant authorities. We conduct two studies with over 2,200 citizens in rural Tanzania to experimentally test whether an intervention designed to socially validate citizens' analytical skills and spoken contributions can positively affect self-efficacy beliefs and increase their engagement. We demonstrate that a relatively simple intervention, developed and implemented in partnership with a local civil society organization, augments citizen self-efficacy beliefs. In a study conducted two years post-treatment, we find higher levels of citizen engagement in schools that received our intervention when compared with those that only received information about the benefits of engagement and those assigned to the control group.

Keywords: self-efficacy, development, education, experiment, Tanzania

Suggested Citation

Lieberman, Evan S. and Zhou, Yang-Yang, Validated Participation Promotes Self-Efficacy and Citizen Engagement in Development (September 14, 2019). Lieberman, Evan, and Yang-Yang Zhou. "Self-Efficacy and Citizen Engagement in Development: Experimental Evidence from Tanzania." Journal of Experimental Political Science (2020): 1-18. , Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3047566 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3047566

Evan S. Lieberman

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Department of Political Science ( email )

77 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02139
United States

Yang-Yang Zhou (Contact Author)

University of British Columbia, Department of Political Science ( email )

323 C.K. Choi Building 1855 West Mall
Vancouver, British Columbia V6T 1Z2
Canada
7787763711 (Phone)
V6T 1Z2 (Fax)

HOME PAGE: http://yangyangzhou.com

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