Department of Economics

Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory (JPART) Doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/jopart/muag027

Abstract Political efforts to weaken democratic institutions place civil servants in a dilemma between political responsiveness and protecting democratic values. As civil servants are embedded in the political-administrative hierarchy, we argue that signals from their direct hierarchical superiors are critical to understand how civil servants address this dilemma. Using a randomized survey experiment among Norwegian national-level civil servants (N = 1,446) and ordered logistic regression models, we find that democratic backsliding increases opposition to government wishes, internal and external voice, and consideration of exit from the organization. Managerial signals moderate these effects: civil servants are more inclined to voice concerns or consider exit when managers signal responsiveness to government wishes. In a conceptual replication and extension among US federal, state and local civil servants (N = 504) using ordered logistic regression models, we likewise find a greater inclination to exit if the manager signals responsiveness to government wishes, but also that respondents are less inclined to voice concerns to the manager. Overall, our findings imply that managerial signals within the political-administrative hierarchy are shaping civil servants’ immediate reactions to democratic backsliding.

Local Government Studies p. 21-21 Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/03003930.2026.2717092

Intermunicipal collaboration is commonly viewed as a way for small municipalities to obtain economies of scale. Empirical research, however, indicates that large municipalities participate in such arrangements just as often as small ones. This is puzzling, as large municipalities probably have exhausted existing scale benefits and may even incur extra costs associated with collaboration. Using a panel dataset on collaboration on child protection services in Norway covering 13 years (2003–2019), we study whether costs and benefits associated with intermunicipal collaboration are asymmetrically distributed among municipalities of different sizes. Results indicate that smaller municipalities increase their capacity through collaboration but also experience cost increases. The largest municipalities experience no significant change in costs, but as they share existing resources with member municipalities, they also dilute their capacity to deliver services to citizens in their own jurisdiction.

Review of Economic Studies p. 1-35 Doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/restud/rdag029

Abstract Linear instrumental variable estimators, such as two-stage least squares (TSLS), are commonly interpreted as estimating non-negatively weighted averages of causal effects, referred to as local average treatment effects (LATEs). We examine whether the LATE interpretation actually applies to the types of TSLS specifications that are used in practice. We show that if the specification includes covariates—which most empirical work does—then the LATE interpretation does not apply in general. Instead, the TSLS estimator will, in general, reflect treatment effects for both compliers and always/never-takers, and some treatment effects for the always/never-takers will necessarily be negatively weighted. We show that the only specifications that have a LATE interpretation are “saturated” specifications that control for covariates nonparametrically, implying that such specifications are both sufficient and necessary for TSLS to have a LATE interpretation, at least without additional parametric assumptions. This result is concerning because, as we document, empirical researchers almost never control for covariates nonparametrically, and rarely discuss or justify parametric specifications of covariates. We apply our results to thirteen empirical studies and find strong evidence that the LATE interpretation of TSLS is far from accurate for the types of specifications actually used in practice. We offer concrete recommendations for practice motivated by our theoretical and empirical results.

American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics 18(3) p. 174-199 Doi: https://doi.org/10.1257/mac.20230083

International Journal of Forecasting Doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijforecast.2026.06.003