Worldwide only about four percent of the estimated $500 billion-plus in public and private climate finance in 2017 was destined for adaptation. However, institutions like the World Bank are positioning themselves for a transformation in adaptation finance, seeking to provide substantially more adaptation finance as distinct from financial support for greenhouse gas mitigation. This article explores the recent emergence of adaptation as a higher priority and how a longer-term time horizon is necessary if a transformation in climate change governance is to occur which places greater emphasis on sustainable development goals relating to improvement of circumstances of citizens in the most climate-vulnerable nations, mostly in the Global South. The article also considers the important debate in the climate change policy literature over the extent to which funds supporting adaptation are going to lower-income nations or people, as might be anticipated given the view that the poor are more vulnerable to the adverse impacts of climate change. Data linking World Bank project funding to climate change adaptation and mitigation, derived from a keyword-matching approach, show that from 2010 to 2018, the share of climate-change-related finance devoted to adaptation in World Bank projects increased considerably. The data indicate that adaptation funding tends to be directed more to more climate-vulnerable nations and those with greater state fragility, but not to low-income countries versus high-income countries. Implications are considered for how this change might be “scaled up” to achieve a transformational status.

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ObjectiveTaxation is crucial for revenue, political participation, and the demand for accountability in Africa. Most existing theories do not predict tax attitudes in informal economies with weak institutional capacity nor do they demonstrate how service delivery translates to stronger tax regimes. This article examines the fiscal exchange theory— how government's expenditure affects voluntary compliance—across Africa, showing mechanisms through which service delivery affects tax morale.MethodsThe study uses a public opinion survey of over 41,000 respondents from 29 countries in sub‐Saharan Africa. The statistical analysis employs an ordered logit model and linear probability model to test the hypotheses.ResultsThe study finds that service delivery determines tax attitudes. In addition, the study examines aspects of service delivery that are of most concern to citizens and finds that services that cater to individual needs are stronger in inducing tax morale than those that address collective needs. The article also finds that citizens’ acknowledgement of receipt of goods is not an indication of inherent incumbent support.ConclusionThis study sought to understand the relationship between different modes of service delivery and the likelihood of having tax morale among African citizens and ultimately sheds light upon citizen–state relationships, effective governance, and voluntary compliance.

The decades-long debate about whether power sharing (consensus) governments or majoritarianism diminish conflict may be missing an even more important element in diminishing conflict, whether all major groups participate in negotiations. Using crucial moments in a regime’s history, the drafting and implementation of new constitutions, this article offers evidence that whether constitution-making processes include all relevant societal groups matters more in diminishing internal nation-state conflict than whether the resulting text constructs power-sharing institutions or majoritarian ones. After establishing this statistical pattern, we conduct further analysis showing that the mechanism of group rights establishment is at least partially responsible; that is, the inclusion of opposition groups in constitution drafting tends to produce group rights language.