Replication Data for: Political Determinants of Economic Exchange: Evidence from a Business Experiment in Senegal

Economic growth requires confidence in the state’s ability to enforce secure exchange. But when states selectively enforce rule of law, political considerations can moderate the trust that buyers have in sellers. I argue that political connections produce moral hazard in exchange because they introduce biases in expectations of judicial enforcement. Buyers avoid trade with politically connected sellers, and, in this context of unequal enforcement, formal contracts disproportionately protect politically connected buyers. To examine these features of connections and contracts, I created a sales business in Senegal and randomized whether employees signaled political connections and/or offered formal contracts during transactions. The results show that political connections decreased buyers’ willingness to exchange. Formal contracts increased exchange, though primarily for connected buyers. These findings show that asymmetric political connections can impede daily trade and intensify economic inequalities in developing contexts, while simultaneously demonstrating the limits of state institutions for mitigating politically-driven moral hazard.

经济增长依赖于社会对国家保障安全交易能力的信心。然而，当国家选择性执行法治时，政治考量会干扰买家对卖家的信任。本文认为，政治关联会在交易场景中催生道德风险，因其会导致司法执行预期产生系统性偏差。在此背景下，买家会主动规避与拥有政治关联的卖家开展交易；同时，由于执法不公，正式合同会不成比例地向有政治关联的买家倾斜。为验证关联与合同的上述特征，笔者在塞内加尔创办了一家销售企业，并在交易流程中开展随机实验：随机设置员工是否向交易对象彰显政治关联，以及是否提供正式合同。实验结果表明，政治关联会显著降低买家的交易意愿；正式合同虽能提升整体交易活跃度，但该积极效应仅主要体现在有政治关联的买家群体中。本研究发现揭示了两层核心结论：其一，不对称的政治关联会阻碍日常贸易活动，并加剧发展中语境下的经济不平等；其二，国家机构在缓解政治诱因引发的道德风险方面存在明显局限。