Recent Guy Tchuente research shows the importance of local knowledge in the provision of publicly financed goods.
Dr Guy Tchuente‘s research is included in a forthcoming OUP book published this September, The Oxford Handbook of the Economy of Cameroon.
The volume aims to challenge traditional narratives about Africa’s economic development and successful paths to prosperity and examining the failures of structural transformation and modernization strategies in Africa.
Decentralization is a centrepiece in Cameroonian’s government institutions’ design. So Tchuente’s chapter elaborates a simple hierarchy model for the analysis of the effects of power devolution. The model predicts the overall positive effects of decentralization with larger effects when the local authority processes useful information on how to better allocate the resources. The estimation of the effects of the 2010’s power devolution to municipalities in Cameroon suggests a positive impact of decentralization on early human capital accumulation. The value added by decentralization is the same for Anglophone and Francophone municipalities; the effects of decentralization are larger for advanced levels of primary school.
‘This research shows the importance of local knowledge in the provision of publicly financed goods.’ Tchuente explains, ‘I hope that the government of Cameroon will devote more effort to its decentralization process. The evaluation methodology proposes here is a guide for policy maker decision-making and evaluation of the effect of the decision.’