Now available: Podcast and presentation from special guest lecture on state capability

Michael Woolcock, Lead Social Development Specialist in the World Bank’s Development Research Group and Lecturer in Public Policy at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, delivered a presentation on ‘The Art, the (Social) Science and the Politics of Building State Capability for Implementation’ as part of OPHI’s lunchtime seminar series.

The talk, on 4 November 2014, addressed an apparent paradox between development indicators that seem to be improving and measures of institutional quality that are flat or declining. It also explored the challenge of implementing policies in developing countries as opposed to just designing them, and outlined an alternative strategy for building state capacity for implementation.

The lecture was based on the paper ‘Looking like a state: Techniques of persistent failure in state capability for implementation‘, which won the 2014 ‘Best Article’ prize from the American Sociological Association’s section on international development.

Listen to a podcast of the special guest lecture and view the slides.

Find out more about upcoming OPHI lunchtime seminars.