when political competition is clientelist. The analysis below also uses these distinctions in the political value of different types of public spending to show that the robust negative correlation of vote buying exists specifically for health spending.

Detailed research on Early Childhood Development (ECD) using panel data from the Philippines provides some _prima facie_ evidence of weak accountability for improving the quality of service delivery for the poor. Researchers document strikingly low levels of health and development among poor Filipino children (Ghuman et al, 2005; Glewwe and King, 2001). Ghuman et al (2005) find that variation in several indicators of child health and development is strongly correlated with variation in the availability of health and ECD services in the village. This suggests scope for municipal allocation of resources to reach the poor more effectively with the basic health services that can improve their well-being.

_Salience of vote buying in political contestation_ Qualitative evidence exists for the Philippines describing the salience of vote buying as a widely accepted practice among the poor (Schaffer, 2005; 2007). Citizens belonging to lowincome groups tend to defend the practice against “upper class” views, describing vote buying as a form of political attention and responsiveness to the needs of the poor. Citizens targeted with vote buying do not think of it as “selling” their vote, but rather as some evidence of the good will and quality of candidates which they factor into their decision-making.<sup>19</sup> Perhaps because of this, the direct survey questions used in this study, on the practice of vote buying in municipalities, seem to have worked well in measuring variation: people are less shy or wary of responding in the affirmative.

Furthermore, the Philippines may provide an appropriate context in which vote buying is a viable electoral strategy, even with secret ballots, operating through traditional institutions of reciprocity ( _utang na loob_ ).<sup>20</sup> Local political operatives in municipal politics might be particularly well embedded in communities and be able to target vote-buying offers to voters with whom there are norms of reciprocity (as in the mechanism examined by Finan and Schechter, 2011).

Other means of enforcing vote buying that has been discussed in the literature has focused on the role of national political parties, assuming that particular types of political parties or politicians, presumably with access to party “machines” or private networks, are likely to be able to rely on such strategies (Stokes, 2005; Schaffer, 2007; Nichter, 2008; Kramon, 2010; Vicente, 2010; Gonzalez-Ocantos et al, 2012).<sup>21</sup> National political parties are weakly organized

> 19 This is not to say that all low-income citizens share the same view of vote buying. Scahffer (2005) describes considerable variation even within the same community in the views of vote buying. This is one reason why this study focuses on aggregating household responses within a community to come-up with an average measure of vote buying, the _variation_ (as opposed to levels) in which is likely reflective of variation in the degree to which the basis of political competition is the provision of particularistic benefits.

> 20 More than 90 percent of the respondents report believing that their vote is secret. This might seem very high in this context of weak institutions. On the other hand, it might be consistent with voters’ beliefs that their vote can only be revealed should they choose to reveal it under a vote buying contract.

> 21 Some have argued that payments to voters may not necessarily be to buy their vote, but rather to buy their “turnout”, or participation at the polls, in contexts where political agents have prior expectations of the political leanings of different constituents (Nichter, 2008; Kramon, 2010).

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