RFPs: Statebuilding in Conflict affected Contexts (Role of Taxation) – Global South

Despite a growing policy focus on statebuilding processes in countries affected by armed violence today, there has been very limited research on the links between taxation, revenue mobilization, conflict dynamics, and statebuilding in these contexts. The main purpose of this project is to address this gap by advancing knowledge about the determinants and sustainability of statebuilding processes in conflict affected countries through the lens of taxation.

Areas

• The project will explore new questions about the types of tax and revenue systems established by different state and non-state actors in wartime. The project also investigates the relationship of tax and revenue systems with governance and political order during conflict. A third important aspect is the implications of these systems for institutional trajectories and processes of state formation and state capacity after conflict. To better understand these transition processes, the project proposes a new research agenda that will advance theoretical and empirical knowledge in the following areas:
  • How does taxation shape the nature of political order during conflict? What explains the use of formal and informal taxation by state and non-state armed groups during conflict? How do these forms of formal, informal, and extra-legal taxation translate into expenditures by armed groups on social services, security and financing war strategies? What kinds of social, economic, or political roles does taxation play in these settings? What is the impact on local communities and local (legal and illegal) economies and markets?
  • How and why does the use of formal, informal, and extra-legal taxation differ across territories, populations, businesses, and within armed groups in wartime and the immediate post-conflict period? Who is taxed, how, how much, why, and what are taxes used for? What factors explain this variation?
  • What are the policy implications of these forms of formal, informal, and extra-legal taxation on processes of state formation and the capacity of state institutions in the aftermath of armed conflicts to raise revenues and uphold the social contract through public expenditures?
• They seek proposals from researchers working on conflict analysis, state building, peacebuilding, taxation or other related fields who would like to contribute to the project. They are particularly interested in papers with a strong empirical contribution on the relationship between taxation and conflict and implications for state building in conflict-affected contexts, but also welcome strong theoretical contributions with relevance to this area of research. They are particularly interested in new research in Africa and Asia, but also welcome work on other regions.

Funding Information

• A total research honorarium of USD 6,000 will be paid in two instalments.

Eligibility Criteria

• UNU-WIDER invites proposals from qualified researchers for papers examining the relationship between taxation and conflict and implications for state building in conflict-affected contexts. The aim is that these papers will be included in a book proposal or published in high-quality journals in economics, political science, development studies, or related fields after publication in the WIDER Working Paper series.
• The papers need to be written in English and should be limited to 10,000 words maximum (inclusive of text, tables, figures, footnotes, references).
• Proposals from individuals (or groups of individuals) as well as non-profit organizations are welcome. Applications from women, early career researchers, and researchers from the Global South are particularly encouraged.
• Individual researchers will be issued UNU Consultant Contracts (CTC), while non-profit organizations will be issued UNU Institutional Contractual Agreements (ICA).

For more information, visit UNU-WIDER.