With Mark Hallerberg at the Hertie School, I am working on a book that examines the selection of economic policymakers and how it is related to government performance. Our project is based on an extensive collection of biographical data and a series of interviews with former prime ministers, finance ministers, and central bank presidents in OECD and EU countries.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, we started a second project to look into claims by commentators about why country responses differed, for instance that governments with certain “types” of policymakers responded more quickly. Spoiler: Beware of anecdotes! You can read a blog piece we wrote for Bruegel on our initial findings and the draft paper with full results here.
With Dan de Kadt from the Department of Methodology at the LSE, I have been studying voter suppression in the Cape of Good Hope (now South Africa) under Prime Minister Cecil Rhodes. Based on a detailed analysis of all registered voters in 1903, we produce new estimates of racial disenfranchisement and examine the mechanisms. Our working paper is here. As part of this project, we digitized a century of South Africa’s historical census publications and education reports, which are now available as an open access resource via the LSE Library.
‘Do Ministers Matter for Audit Performance? Evidence from Cabinet Appointments During South Africa’s “State of Capture”’ [with Daniel Berliner and Martin Haus]. Draft available as an ODI Working Paper (January 2023).
Joachim Wehner 