Motivation: While there is increasing evidence that taxation can contribute to greater government responsiveness and accountability, such positive outcomes are not guaranteed. If the environment does not enable tax bargaining, there is a risk that taxation will amount to little more than enforced extraction. Purpose: We consider how such enabling environments may be fostered and identify specific strategies that governments, civil society actors, and donors can adopt to strengthen the links between taxation, responsiveness, and accountability. Methods and approach: We undertake two case studies of tax transparency and taxpayer engagement in Ghana and Sierra Leone, making use of data from taxpayer surveys, focus group discussions (FGDs), and interviews with key stakeholders in government, civil society, and donor agencies. Findings: We highlight two key findings. First, meaningful transparency requires that information is comprehensive, relates to taxpayers' priorities, and serve as a basis for dialogue between taxpayers and governments. Second, there is a need to proactively encourage taxpayer engagement by supporting forums for engagement that taxpayers perceive as safe, secure and sincere. This has been most successful where governments have visibly demonstrated responsiveness to citizens' concerns, even on a small scale, while partnering with civil society to foster trust and dialogue. Policy implications: Our findings point to the need for taxpayer education and engagement programmes that make information more accessible and more directly relevant to taxpayers' everyday experiences. In particular, policymakers and development partners need to expand existing efforts to facilitate engagement and dialogue regarding what revenues are collected and how they are spent. We highlight the valuable role that civil society can play as translators of tax information, enablers of public forums, and trainers to support greater tax literacy and sustained taxpayer engagement.

No abstract

Property tax administration is the bedrock for effective revenue mobilisation, development, and good local governance for local governments. Yet administering property taxation continues to be a major problem, especially for many developing countries. Scholarly explanations for this poor state of affairs have focused on limited capacity, poor quality local cadastres, corruption, and local political resistance to effective property tax administration, among others. This paper moves away from these explanations to focus on a less trodden area: the relationship between central and local government and how this relationship affects property tax administration. Property tax administration involves some collaboration and overlap between different levels of government, and thus depends very much on a good and functional relationship between both levels of government, especially when local governments derive their authorities from the largesse of central governments. This relationship may have powerful implications for the ability of local governments to effectively undertake property tax administration due to the central government’s policies and politics. Using Ghana as a case study, the paper illustrates how a dysfunctional relationship between central and local governments has undermined, and continues to undermine, effective property tax administration in the country, which should serve as a lesson for other developing countries.

No abstract

There is increasingly strong evidence that taxation can contribute to expanded government responsiveness and accountability. However, such positive connections are not guaranteed. Rather, they are shaped by the political and economic context and specific policies adopted by governments and civil society actors. Without an environment that enables tax bargaining, there is a risk that taxation will amount to little more than forceful extraction. We consider how such enabling environments may be fostered through two mixed methods case studies of tax transparency and taxpayer engagement in Sierra Leone and Ghana. We highlight two key sets of findings. First, tax transparency is only meaningful if it is accessible and easily understood by taxpayers and relates to their everyday experiences and priorities. In particular, we find that taxpayers do not just want basic information about tax obligations or aggregate revenue collected, but information about how much revenue should have been collected and how revenues were spent. At the same time, taxpayers do not want information to be shared with them through a one-way form of communication, but rather want to have spaces for dialogue and interaction with tax and government officials, including through public meetings and radio call-in programmes. Second, strategies to encourage taxpayer engagement are more likely to be effective where forums for engagement are perceived by taxpayers to be safe, secure, and sincere means through which to engage with government officials. This has been most successful where governments have visibly demonstrated responsiveness to citizen concerns, even on a small scale, while partnering with civil society to foster trust, dialogue and expanded knowledge. These findings have significant implications for how governments design taxpayer education and engagement programmes and how civil society actors and development partners can support more equitable and accountable tax systems. Our findings provide concrete lessons for how governments can ensure that information shared with taxpayers is meaningful and accessible. Moreover, we show that civil society actors can play important roles as translators of tax information, enablers of public forums and dialogues around tax issues, and trainers of taxpayers, supporting greater tax literacy and sustained citizen engagement.