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Evaluating the Efficiency of Governmental Excellence for Social Progress: Focusing on Low- and Lower-Middle-Income Countries

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Abstract

As the “weak-institutions trap” is increasingly recognized as the major hindrance to growth, the advantages offered by e-government may provide an opportunity for these counties to escape this trap. From a stance emphasizing the importance of a state’s fundamental capacity, this study advances the literature by including a country’s e-government development as another dimension of government capacity. With this perspective, we examine how efficiently each country’s governmental capacity is enhancing social progress performance in low- and lower-middle-income countries by applying data envelopment analysis. The results of the efficiency test were then combined with income level, used widely to categorize countries, for clustering analysis, aiming to discover certain characteristics or typologies across countries. The results offer a guide to how efficiently (in comparison with others) each country’s governmental excellence is yielding the outcome of social progress, the nature of their limitations, and how countries at a similar economic level are performing, as a potential benchmarking target.

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Notes

  1. See https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/01/gdp.

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Appendix

Appendix

<Cluster 1, n = 7>

Country

CPIA

EGDI

BHN

FOW

OPP

Score

GNI

Afghanistan

2.65

0.19

41.55

43.46

22.65

0.800

660

Central African Republic

2.43

0.13

29.84

41.42

18.83

0.842

320

Ethiopia

3.47

0.26

50.57

52.25

27.68

0.716

550

Madagascar

3.13

0.26

43.76

56.91

37.05

0.832

440

Mozambique

3.59

0.24

45.50

58.76

39.62

0.848

620

Rwanda

3.99

0.36

57.26

59.25

39.21

0.684

690

Uganda

3.74

0.26

52.13

60.21

39.72

0.837

690

Average

3.29

0.24

45.80

53.18

32.11

0.794

567.14

<Cluster 2, n = 9>

Country

CPIA

EGDI

BHN

FOW

OPP

Score

GNI

Burkina Faso

3.65

0.18

51.77

53.46

42.80

0.994

680

Guinea

3.03

0.10

45.58

51.23

28.18

1.000

470

Liberia

3.10

0.18

45.99

48.97

40.24

1.000

370

Malawi

3.19

0.23

54.62

57.82

47.87

1.000

360

Mali

3.37

0.16

53.46

50.89

34.38

1.000

790

Nepal

3.39

0.23

69.53

60.67

42.00

1.000

740

Niger

3.42

0.09

48.11

45.15

31.64

1.000

420

Sierra Leone

3.27

0.13

41.05

55.20

36.39

1.000

770

Togo

2.99

0.24

50.19

56.53

40.38

0.959

550

Average

3.27

0.17

51.14

53.32

38.21

0.995

572.22

<Cluster 3, n = 11>

Country

CPIA

EGDI

BHN

FOW

OPP

Score

GNI

Cameroon

3.18

0.28

52.70

56.19

32.75

0.804

1350

Kenya

3.82

0.38

52.40

67.96

40.79

0.704

1300

Kyrgyz Republic

3.55

0.47

75.90

64.25

48.58

0.769

1260

Moldova

3.79

0.56

80.25

64.91

49.02

0.675

2560

Mongolia

3.25

0.56

64.94

64.69

58.77

0.714

4260

Nigeria

3.53

0.29

46.63

60.47

32.38

0.720

2970

Sri Lanka

3.52

0.54

75.40

68.61

42.61

0.670

3650

Tanzania

3.76

0.28

47.13

60.95

41.90

0.801

920

Uzbekistan

3.38

0.47

83.09

57.10

41.27

0.734

2090

Yemen, Rep.

2.97

0.27

54.99

50.62

19.67

0.706

1440

Zimbabwe

2.66

0.36

51.29

62.33

33.72

0.779

840

Average

3.40

0.40

62.25

61.64

40.13

0.734

2058.18

<Cluster 4, n = 4>

Country

CPIA

EGDI

BHN

FOW

OPP

Score

GNI

Bangladesh

3.38

0.28

65.53

60.15

32.52

0.877

1080

Cambodia

3.43

0.30

59.14

64.23

39.46

0.872

1020

Pakistan

3.18

0.26

62.81

53.87

30.70

0.871

1400

Senegal

3.82

0.27

65.31

58.60

43.01

0.906

1040

Average

3.45

0.28

63.20

59.21

36.42

0.882

1135

<Cluster 5, n = 7>

Country

CPIA

EGDI

BHN

FOW

OPP

Score

GNI

Benin

3.51

0.17

53.35

58.26

38.47

1.000

900

Chad

2.69

0.11

36.75

45.27

27.11

1.000

980

Cote d’Ivoire

3.25

0.20

54.24

57.37

35.31

0.985

1450

Lesotho

3.34

0.26

53.44

51.56

52.17

0.959

1470

Mauritania

3.38

0.19

55.26

52.97

30.01

0.915

1370

Myanmar

3.05

0.19

63.11

55.94

30.47

1.000

1200

Tajikistan

3.18

0.34

69.72

65.37

41.25

0.917

1370

Average

3.20

0.21

55.12

55.25

36.40

0.968

1248.57

<Cluster 6, n = 6>

Country

CPIA

EGDI

BHN

FOW

OPP

Score

GNI

Bolivia

3.56

0.46

72.62

72.23

49.35

0.804

2870

Congo, Rep.

3.04

0.26

45.88

64.19

39.16

0.932

2720

Ghana

3.37

0.37

60.41

68.59

52.12

0.888

1590

Honduras

3.41

0.41

66.20

69.01

46.70

0.822

2260

Lao PDR

3.36

0.27

65.84

56.93

34.85

0.901

1640

Nicaragua

3.71

0.28

71.72

71.15

46.22

1.000

1870

Average

3.41

0.34

63.78

67.02

44.73

0.891

2158.33

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Choi, H., Park, M.J. Evaluating the Efficiency of Governmental Excellence for Social Progress: Focusing on Low- and Lower-Middle-Income Countries. Soc Indic Res 141, 111–130 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-018-1835-1

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