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

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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 aids effectiveness in winning over the support of an embattled population. Recent research has produced conflicting results. Methodological Challenge: Non-random assignment of aid.

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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 peoples 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.

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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.

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Context: National Solidarity Program (NSP) NSP is the largest development program in Afghanistan. Over 32,000 of Afghanistans 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

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

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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. 2011 Midline EstimatesEndline Estimates Baseline Survey Aug. Sep. 2007 1 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

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Security Events Data ISAF data on security incidents (almost exclusively IEDs-) with exact location, date and time for the period 01/2006-12/2011. Look at three different periods Before the start of the program (Jan 2006 Sept 2007) Midline Period (Oct 2007- Sept 2009) Endline Period (Oct 2009- Dec 2011)

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VariableTreatment Effect Midline Treatment Effect Endline P value for equality of coefficients N Male Respondent Expects Household's Situation to Improve Next Year 0.052 (0.011)*** [0.012]*** 0.021 (0.019)* [0.013] 0.0358,946 Female Respondent Expects Household Situation to Improve Next Year 0.046 (0.014)*** [0.024]* 0.039 (0.010)*** [0.023]* 0.6728,017 Summary Measure of Objective Wellbeing 0.030 (0.015)** [0.023] 0.015 (0.017) [0.018] 0.4258,990 Economic Welfare and Governance Attitudes Summary Measure of Governance Attitudes 0.096 (0.021)*** [0.043]** 0.056 (0.018)*** [0.031]* 0.114 8,982

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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 0.050 (0.013)** [0.022] ** 0.044 (0.015)*** [0.026]* 0.7298,962 Compared to Two Years Ago Teenage Girls feel less Safe when Traveling to School and Socializing -0.036 (0.016)** [0.011]*** -0.012 (0.014) (0.020) 0.2317,128 Attacks based on ISAF measure -0.016 (0.041) [0.037]** -0.021 (0.031) [0.047] 0.2251,000 Occurrence of a Security Incident -0.051 (0.041) [0.029]* 0.010 (0.037) [0.039] 0.301,000

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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 0.056 (0.021)*** [0.023]** 0.051 (0.013)*** [0.012]*** 0.043 (0.023)* [0.021]** 0.014 (0.010) [0.021] Female Respondent Expects Household Situation to Improve Next Year 0.013 (0.024) [0.003]*** 0.072 (0.015)*** [0.021]*** 0.060 (0.027)** [0.010]*** 0.046 (0.013)*** [0.027]* The Role of Initial Level of Insecurity Summary Measure for Objective Wellbeing 0.034 [0.036] [0.011]*** 0.029 [0.017]* [0.026] -0.040 [0.040] [0.039] 0.032 [0.018]* [0.028] Summary Measure for Governance Attitudes 0.038 (0.043) [0.031] 0.111 (0.023)*** [0.048]** 0.103 (0.037)*** [0.007]*** 0.042 (0.021)]** [0.035]

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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 0.012 (0.022) [0.023] 0.061 (0.016)*** [0.026]** 0.039 (0.034) [0.015] 0.045 (0.016)** [0.032] Teenage Girls Feel Less Safe Going to School and Socializing Compared to Two Years Ago -0.002 (0.033) [0.049] -0.044 (0.018)** [0.012]*** 0.013 (0.026) [0.014] -0.017 (0.028) [0.013]** Attacks based on ISAF measure 0.170 (0.122) [0.155] -0.073 (0.033)** [0.028]** 0.034 (0.105) [0.132] -0.037 (0.019)* [0.030] Occurrence of a Security Incident 0.184 (0.164) [0.167] -0.091 (0.036)** [0.034]*** 0.148 (0.095) [0.154] -0.037 (0.042) [0.029] The Role of Initial Level of Insecurity

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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.

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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, t is the dummy for period t, pt is the village-pair*period fixed effect. Standard errors clustered at village-cluster level; also account for spatial correlation( Conley, 1999 ).