Slavery, Reconstruction, and Bureaucratic Capacity in the American South

Abstract

Conventional political economy models predict taxation will increase after franchise expansion to low-income voters. Yet, contrary to expectations, in ranked societies—where social status is a cleavage—elites can instead build cross-class coalitions to undertake a strategy of bureaucratic weakening to limit future redistributive taxation. We study a case where status hierarchies were particularly extreme: the post-Civil War American South. During Reconstruction, under federal oversight, per capita taxation was higher in counties where slavery had been more extensive before the war, as predicted by standard theoretical models. After Reconstruction ended, however, taxes fell and bureaucratic capacity was weaker where slavery had been widespread. Moreover, higher intrawhite economic inequality was associated with lower taxes and weaker capacity after Reconstruction in formerly high-slavery counties. These findings on the interaction between intrawhite economic inequality and pre-War slavery suggest that elites built cross-class coalitions against taxation where whites sought to protect their racial status.

When the State Becomes Complicit: Mayors, Criminal Actors, and the Deliberate Weakening of the Local State in Colombia

“…In many of these areas, however, state officials openly contribute to the persistence of weak states by manipulating and selectively enforcing property rights and allocation of land for their own benefit. In particular, this article is consistent with the claim that “hollowing out the state” has been a common strategy in different settings (Suryanarayan & White, 2020). Future research should further investigate the conditions under which politicians engage in a deliberate strategy of state weakening and the mechanisms—societal and political—that may curb its use.…”

“…Weakening the State as a Politically Strategic Decision I argue that politicians and their criminal partners deliberately undermine local state capacity by preventing and delaying additional investments in local institutions and hiding critical information from the state. In developing this argument, I join a rank of scholars that highlight the intentional weakening of state institutions as a politically strategic decision across a variety of settings (e.g., non-civil war and non-criminal war), different ulterior motives (e.g., avoid redistribution and defeat local chiefs), and varying strategies (e.g., cross-class coalitions and criminal alliances) (Christensen & Garfias, 2020;Fergusson et al, 2020b;Onoma, 2009;Suryanarayan & White, 2020).…”

“…Politicians and criminals can actively undermine state capacity by dismantling key institutions and preventing additional investments in them. For instance, Suryanarayan and White (2020) show how, during the post-Reconstruction period in the United States, Southern elites established cross-class coalitions to deliberately weaken bureaucratic capacity and limit redistributive taxation in the future. Dismantling local bureaucracies responsible for the implementation of programs, the access to property and land, and adjudication of disputes can be exploited as a way to preserve and appropriate one's own political power.…”

“…However, rather than seeing state weakness as a mere unintended negative effect of criminal politics, I suggest that "hollowing out" the state is a politically strategic decision that serves the interests of both criminals and politicians. I join existing work highlighting the intentional erosion of state institutions (e.g., Onoma, 2009;Suryanarayan & White, 2020) but focus on a setting of violence and criminal politics.…”

Group Ties amid Industrial Change

“…They also include quasi-institutionalized risksharing arrangements, such as mutual aid societies and fraternal insurance associations, that provide an informal safety net for in-group members experiencing losses of income. 21 These groups are politically 15 Mansfield and Mutz 2009;Guisinger 2017;Jardina 2019;Baccini and Weymouth 2021;Suryanarayan and White 2021. 16 Laitin 1998.…”