Internet, all of which are associated with content differentiation and market segmentation that may have contributed to increased polarization.

The evidence from U.S. experience has implications for how to generate ideas about harnessing transparency to address similar problems of ideological beliefs among citizens in developing countries, such as the government’s role in controlling prices by subsidizing essential commodities. The insights from the United States can explain developing countries’ experience with subsidy reforms— informing citizens about the cost of subsidies is not sufficient to solve the problem (Clements et al. 2013). Widespread beliefs about the corruptibility of officials make idiosyncratic policy choices—such as subsidy reforms—seem suspect, thereby providing honest politicians with incentives to pander to populist demands. Leaders who emerge from political markets with popular mandates for public service delivery may be key actors who can bring about a shift in beliefs and norms for society to escape the trap of populist policies.

In sum, the experience of engaging in political markets, the degree of overlap between media and political markets, and audience segmentation across media outlets appear to be fundamental determinants of how preferences and beliefs are formed with regard to public goods and the role of government. Papers in the growing literature on media’s impact on political actions in the US, UK or European countries have already challenged the traditional view among social scientists that media messages cannot easily sway public opinion or voting behavior in established democracies (Ladd and Lenz, 2009; Gerber et al, 2009). Established work has already shown that media can persuade citizens to turn out to vote, or to support one or the other of ideologically committed political parties (Druckman and Parkin, 2005; DellaVigna and Kaplan, 2007; Chiang and Knight, 2011; DellaVigna and Gentzkow, 2010). Whether media can also persuade citizens about what types of policies to demand, or enable citizens to enter the supply side as contenders for leadership on platforms of public goods, are big and open questions.

Keefer and Khemani (2014) provide the first evidence of the importance of apolitical, public interest media programs in shifting citizen support away from politicians who offer private benefits that would come at the expense of public goods. General, apolitical information provided by media may influence how citizens think about the role of public policies and what to demand from their political representatives. For example, citizens may support politicians who offer policies of trade protectionism because they believe these are the appropriate actions that leaders should take in the national interest of creating domestic jobs. Would media programs that inform citizens about technical evidence on these policies, such as, perhaps, that protectionism may come at the expense of long-term growth and jobs, reduce citizen demand for such policy offers? The survey evidence discussed in this paper shows that in poor countries citizens believe that provision of government jobs, and management of prices, are exactly what governments should be doing, perhaps because free markets cannot be trusted to address the injustices of poverty and inequality. Would media programs about technical evidence against government intervention in well functioning markets change citizens’ minds? Would such media specializing in the discussion of technical evidence also influence actions on the supply-side, such as providing platforms for new types of leaders to emerge who seek to build common ground for public goods?

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