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The savings–growth nexus is widely acknowledged, both in policy and in the literature. But Kenya’s numerous policy initiatives to encourage savings mobilization are yet to yield the expected outcomes. This paper identifies the key drivers of domestic saving in Kenya, exploiting...
Part of Journal Special Issue Clientelist Politics and Development
THIS ARTICLE IS PART OF A FORTHCOMING JOURNAL SPECIAL ISSUE OF WORLD DEVELOPMENT | Why does clientelism persist? What determines how politicians signal responsiveness to voters and exert effort towards fulfilling campaign promises? This article explores how state capacity, legislative...
Illicit financial flows directly impact a country’s ability to raise, retain, and mobilize its own resources to finance sustainable development. Against a backdrop of a weak public financial position attributed to capital flight, tax avoidance, and dependence on corporate income taxes,...
We examine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Kenya’s foreign trade using quarterly trade data for the period 2019 to the second quarter of 2021. The exploratory analysis shows that growth of Kenya’s merchandise exports remained resilient, largely supported by traditional...
The role of exports in promoting economic growth has been widely acknowledged. This paper analyses the link between exports, imports, and growth performance in Kenya using time series data. Despite trade liberalization and export promotion policies pursued over time, Kenya’s export growth...
Why does clientelism persist? What determines how politicians signal responsiveness or fulfil their campaign promises? Existing works assume that politicians choose the most successful means of winning votes—either through targeted patronage/clientelism or programmatic policies. However...
Are candidates who hand out clientelistic goods at election time less likely to provide services once they take office? This paper examines the poor’s expectations of future service provision by candidates who hand out money and other goods versus those who do not. We hypothesize that the...
In this background note, we examine how different firms and sectors rebound or prevail in crises. We draw on insights from the performance (upgrading potential) of Kenyan horticulture, tea, and leather export firms during two recent, but very different, shocks to the Kenyan economy. The first is...
The objective of this research is to assess the extent to which export processing zones in Botswana, Kenya, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe integrate the Sustainable Development Goals in their implementation and operations. We focused on four Sustainable Development Goals—gender equality, decent...
COVID-19 causes extremely high mortality among the old. This motivates a comparison of the losses of future lifetime years and future lifetime years of work ensuing from a hypothetical 25,000 excess deaths in Italy, whose affluent population is one of the world’s oldest, with those in Kenya,...
The COVID-19 pandemic has now spread to over 180 countries, including several countries in sub-Saharan Africa.1 Kenya reported its first COVID-19 case on 13 March 2020. By 31 March the number of confirmed cases had risen to 59, with over 70 per cent of infections in Nairobi. As at 22 April 2020,...
The role of exports in promoting economic growth has been widely acknowledged. This paper analyses the link between exporting and growth performance in Kenya using time series data. Despite trade liberalization and export promotion policies pursued over time, Kenya’s export growth has...
In recent decades, the impact of South African foreign direct investment in Africa has been captured by research and policy. This paper investigates linkages and spillover effects of South African foreign direct investment in Botswana and Kenya. The study uses primary data to investigate...
Objective To assess compliance with infection prevention and control practices in primary health care in Kenya. Methods We used an observational, patient-tracking tool to assess compliance with infection prevention and control practices by 1680 health-care workers during outpatient...