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Laboratory for Applied Analysis of Institutions and Social Capital
Head – Professor Leonid Polishchuk (lpolishchuk[at]hse.ru)
Research projects:
- Performance Assessment of Non-Profit Associations: The Importance of Being Social
- Economic Payoff to Social Capital in Russian Cities
- Social capital and education
- Property Rights and Elites Turnover: A Safe Landing Perspective
- The Roads We Take and Governments We Elect
- Property Rights Formalization: The Mystery of “Dacha Amnesty”
Performance Assessment of Non-Profit Associations: The Importance of Being Social
Non-profit non-governmental organizations (NGOs) expend resources to produce certain goods and services, which makes them similar to private firms. However, unlike such firms, NGOs do not make profit, which considerably complicates the task of their performance (efficiency) assessment. To make it worse, NGOs’ products are often immaterial and gave no market valuation. NGOs often pursue multiple goals which could be difficult to compare against each other. Finally, various stakeholder groups might have different perspectives and perceptions of NGOs performance and outcomes.
We measure performance of NGOs and especially of their particular type – non-profit associations by means of approximation of their production possibility frontiers based on empirical data. This method was used to derive performance indexes of homeowners associations (HOAs) established by apartment owners to jointly manage their common property, such as apartment buildings’ infrastructure. Russian residential housing reform provides for divesting municipal governments of building management responsibilities and transferring those to communities of tenants.
Russian HOAs encounter multiple problems in their work, and often end up in a failure. At the same time there are quite a few impressive success stories when tenants were able to dramatically improve the conditions of their buildings, cut waste and use available resources more effectively. Application of the production frontier method to HOAs is facilitated by the fact that there is a very large number of such organizations serving identical and rather well-defined purposes. The observed performance variations call for identifying factors and causes of success and failures.
Data for our project was collected by a survey of HOA members and managers in 82 such organizations in two Russian cities – Moscow and Perm (the Zircon Group participated in the data collection). The obtained performance indexes exhibited wide variation, and subsequent analysis revealed endogenous factors explaining performance, including tangible and intangible assets of HOAs. In particular, properly defined and measured social capital in tenant communities provide to be of high importance for HOA success. The analysis also sheds light on the role of HOA governance and management companies in organizational efficiency.
The project gives a clearer perspective of the potential and constraints in the Russian residential housing reform, and of the capacity for self-organization in Russian cities.
Contact person: Ekaterina Borisova (ekaterina.i.borisova[at]gmail.com)
Economic Payoff to Social Capital in Russian Cities
The objective of this project is to reveal and quantify the link between social capital and economic development in welfare in Russian cities. Put differently, we want to measure the economic payoff to social capital in modern Russia. A vast literature deals with assessment of social capital economic impact, but no such analyses were conducted prior to our work on Russian data. This is a non-trivial exercise with no ready-made methodologies, since the nature of the link between social capital and development is very much country-specific, and various components of social capital could be relevant depending on a given country’s context.
The project draws on data of a large-scale survey conducted by the «Public Opinion” foundation as a part of the GeoRating program. The survey involved 34,000 respondents from nearly 2,000 Russian cities and towns. We also used information from other sources, including official statistics collected by the Russian government. The available data provide information on respondents’ values, norms and behavioral patterns, including their propensity for self-organization and collective action, cohesion and mutual consent, as well as the sense of personal responsibility for the situation in their cities. Respondents also provided assessment of socio-economic conditions in their cities, and of the performance of city governments.
Factor analysis of the data revealed three latent factors of social norms and attitudes that we interpret as resp. open (bridging) and closed (bonding) forms of social capital, and as civic culture. We show that there is a strong and statistically significant positive link between economic situation and welfare, on the one hand, and open social capital and civic culture, on the other, whereas such link with closed social capital is strongly negative. These are the results that one would expect: cities with higher degree of social cohesion and greater feeling of individual responsibilities for public affairs are better-off than those lacking the right kind of social capital. In Russia, however, these are not a priory foregone conclusions, and their empirical confirmation is important.
To establish causality between social capital and urban development, various instruments are being tested in the project, including education, past experience of self-organization, migration and the role of the middle class.
Contact person: Rinat Menyashev (rmenyashev[at]hse.ru)
Social capital and education
Education and social capital are closely intertwined with each other. While the main purpose of education is accumulation of human capital, social capital’s buildup is an important side effect. The difference between the two is that the former benefits primarily individuals, whereas the latter is a valuable resource of societies and communities.
Empirical evidences show that virtually all components of social capital – trust, participation in organizations, civic engagement, etc. – are closely related to the level of education. There are three possible channels of education’s impact on social capital: 1) young people’s socialization during enrollment in educational programs, 2) internalization of social and ethical norms that educational programs seek to promote, such as the sense of civic duties, and 3) general cognitive and intellectual development that enables better understanding of the link between private and public interest, increases ability to better grasp complex social problems, articulate and present one’s views, and seek public agreement.
In its turn, social capital increases the efficiency of the education system and contributes to higher academic attainment by students. Therefore education is both an outcome and factor of social capital accumulation.
In this project we study the relationship between education and social capital in Russian cities and regions. Our task is to find empirical evidence of the impact of social capital on students’ academic attainment at the primary and secondary levels. We also analyze the reverse impact of education on the civic culture and social practices and activities in modern Russia. Data from multiple sources, including various surveys, educational monitoring activities, and official statistics, are used to these ends. This is a multi-disciplinary project that employs theories and analytical tools of various of economics, sociology, and psychology.
Contact person: Timur Natkhov (timur.natkhov@gmail.com)
Property Rights and Elites Turnover: A Safe Landing Perspective
Property rights are known to be indispensable for economic development and social welfare. It is therefore important to have a clear view of factors that could enhance or hamper property rights protection. This project posits that one of such factors is the turnover of political elites. This hypothesis is not new in and of itself – the existing literature argues that political competition between various elite groups is beneficial for the quality of institutions, because competing parties seek to win voters’ support by offering policies conducive for economic growth and enhancing employment and income. The novel feature of our project is the emphasis on a different link which could still be present when democratic institutions and conventional political competition are not fully developed, i.e. elites’ direct interest in protection from expropriation in the event they should lose power and cannot rely any longer on the “administrative resource”.
We have developed an economic model that illustrates the above link and generates hypotheses for empirical testing. Our regression analysis incorporates international property rights indexes and political data bases; it shows that indeed there is a statically significant link between property rights protection and elite turnover. It is symptomatic that such link is particularly pronounced for less democratic countries, which corroborates our vision of the nature of such relationship. More rigorous “difference in differences” approach further supports this hypothesis. Presently we are working to confirm causality by using proper instrumental variables; it is also our plan to investigate the link between property rights protection and elite turnover in Russian regions.
Contact person: Georgiy Syunyaev (gsyunyaev[at]hse.ru)
The Roads We Take and Governments We Elect
Deplorable conditions of roads in Russian cities have become proverbial, causing massive losses or time, welfare, economic opportunities and increasingly human life. The rapid growth of car ownership only partly explains the present plight. We posit that the problem has its roots, among other things, in prevailing norms, values and behavioral routines comprising social capital. Such vision of urban traffic problems so far has just barely made it in the economic literature, and our project’s aim is to close this gap.
We assume two possible channels of social capital’s impact on the road conditions – horizontal and vertical. The former has to do with drivers’ and pedestrians’ behavior in their everyday life – mutual assistance; respect and awareness of each other’s needs; joint efforts to avoid problems on the roads, and if such problems should occur – deal with them collectively; observance of traffic rules. The latter channel is political: social capital-based civic activism makes municipal governments more accountable and thus improves the quality of urban planning, road construction and maintenance, road police work, etc.
The hypothesis of social capital’s significance for urban traffic and road conditions is tested by using survey data collected jointly with the MarketData polling agency in a sample of large Russian cities. We also received over two thousand filled questionnaires by posting them on several discussion forums. Preliminary analysis corroborates our hypothesis; in particular, a negative relation between social capital and automobile insurance premiums has been established. The project also includes various case studies and analyses of self-organization in motorist communities.
Contact person: Daria Zubareva (daria.zubareva[at]gmail.com)
Property Rights Formalization: The Mystery of “Dacha Amnesty”
The famous books by Hernando De Soto “Another Path” and “The Mystery of Capital” highlighted the importance of including in the formal economy of small real estate units and other assets that households possess de facto, but for which they don’t have formal property titles. High entry barriers surrounding the formal sector and at times prohibitive costs of obtaining legal confirmation of property rights cause economic backwardness and breed massive corruption. Recognition of importance of small assets seamless inclusion in the formal economy prompted a reform initiative in Russia, knows as the “dacha amnesty”. The reform initiated in 2006 was expected to radically simplify and the procedures for obtaining property titles for small plots of land and dwellings, and thus facilitate de jure confirmation of possession rights. However the reform has failed to produce expected results, and our project’s aim is to explain such failure and identify obstacles to the “dacha amnesty”.
The project employs modern property rights and political economy theories, as well as recent economics of reform literature. Among possible causes of the observed failure of the “dacha amnesty” are a lack of professional, financial and administrative support to the reform which apparently is not viewed as a priority; corruption and lack of incentives among officials in charge of the reform; resistance of large developers and real estate speculators; suppressed conditions of real estate markets in many Russian regions; etc. At present empirical tools for the project are being developed; possible sources of data include surveys, in-depth interviews, consultations with real estate and legal experts, land registry materials, etc.
Contact person: Ekaterina Khmelnitskaya (ekaterina.khmelnitskaya[at]gmail.com)
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