Date of Conferral

2020

Degree

Ph.D.

School

Public Policy and Administration

Advisor

Victor Ferreros

Abstract

Donors have been increasingly using budget support since 2000 to associate development aid delivery with improved development institutions and good policies that will ensure aid effectiveness, in particular in West Africa Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) countries. There is however little evidence that budget support promotes good policies and institutions in WAEMU countries. The purpose of this quantitative research was to explore relationships between budget support as an official development assistance modality and public expenditures efficiency as an indicator of public governance quality. The aid effectiveness theoretical framework developed by Cordello and Dell ’Ariccia informed research questions to determine whether budget support generates efficiency gains or losses in public governance quality measured by government spending efficiency in recipient countries. The study used a time series cross-sectional design with 8 WAEMU countries which benefited from budget support between 1995 and 2015. Panel regressions were used to test relationships between public expenditure efficiency and budget support variables. Findings indicate that the use of budget support by donors and proportion of budget support amount in government revenues and in total aid predict public expenditures efficiency. This prediction is mediated by initial level of efficiency and moderated by political context. The findings provide evidence for aid providers to use budget support to stimulate public governance quality in the neediest and most poorly governed countries and improve aid effectiveness in terms of aid amount that reaches the poorest.

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