Social Accountability in the Delivery of Social Protection
This report reviews the literature on social accountability in the delivery of social protection. It is the second output of the Social Accountability in Social Protection policy research project that Development Pathways has been contracted to carry out by DFID. The purpose of this review is to bring together...
Read MoreAdolescent Girls and Education: challenges, evidence and gaps
In recognition of the criticality of adolescence, the severity of deprivation adolescent girls face, and the opportunities we have to support girls, there has been considerable recent interest in better understanding adolescent girls’ lives. Of particular interest have been the pathways out of poverty for girls, with education being...
Read MoreGood Practice in the Development of Management Information Systems for Social Protection
In recent years, social protection has moved rapidly up the policy agenda in developing countries. Debates on the design of social protection schemes, however, are often dominated by ideological discussions, such as whether to introduce conditions. Less attention is given to implementation challenges and the demands placed on countries’...
Read MoreExclusion by Design: an assessment of the effectiveness of the proxy means test poverty targeting mechanism (ESS Working Paper No. 56)
This paper assesses the effectiveness of the proxy means test (PMT) targeting methodology. It brings together international evidence to show that it is both inaccurate and arbitrary. The mechanism suffers from high in-built design errors, additional errors introduced during implementation, and infrequent surveys, meaning that it cannot respond to...
Read MoreSocial Assistance in Vietnam: A review and proposals for reform
The paper sets out the strengths and weaknesses of the current national social protection system and shows that, if Vietnam were to adopt a more inclusive life cycle social protection system – at a cost, initially of no more than 1% of GDP – the reforms would have significant...
Read MoreIndia’s Basic Income Experiment
This brief looks at the effects of a basic income pilot project conducted in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. Despite a short implementation period and relatively low benefit levels, the effects were impressive: by the end of the project it was possible to see significant improvements in living...
Read MoreBOLSA unFAMILIAr
This short paper aims to answer this question by assessing the evidence on Brazil’s social security system. It will examine the beneficiary numbers, budgets, levels of benefits and, importantly, impacts and coverage of the main social security schemes in Brazil. This paper will reveal that the real hero driving...
Read MoreTo Condition or Not to Condition: What is the evidence?
Development Pathways undertook a series of experiments which aimed to compare conditional and unconditional transfers. This brief outlines the results of these...
Read MoreThe Political Economy of “Targeting” of Social Security Schemes
This paper examines the evidence on the political economy of “targeting.” It will begin by examining the history of social security in developed countries, focusing in particular on the evolution of Poor Relief in 19th Century Europe. It will then examine contemporary tax-financed old age pensions and Poor Relief...
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