Panel Paper:
Who Decides Who Gets the Money and Why? the Political Settlement of Social Cash Transfers in Zambia
*Names in bold indicate Presenter
The political settlement of social cash transfers in Zambia
The Zambian Government has long been criticized for showing only little commitment to social cash transfer (SCT). In fact, for more than a decade Zambia’s aid donors have taken a leading role in designing, initiating, and financing a variety of different SCT targeting approaches at a smaller scale. In 2014 however Zambia initiated its first Harmonised National SCT scheme, a decision accompanied by a dramatic increase of the government’s funding contribution by 700 percent in order to implement the scheme nation-wide. With the decision to implement a nation-wide SCT model a vital decision was taken on who should receive cash transfers in Zambia. The model proposed to target a variety of household compositions – including households with a lot of children - giving it the name: Inclusive model. But only after one year of implementing the scheme, the targeting approach was drastically changed excluding households with a lot of children unless one of the household members has a disability or is old.
Given this drastic change in the targeting of Zambia’s first National SCT model, this study aims at understanding the dynamics of Zambia’s political settlement that have produced a new version of the National SCT model. In line with the political settlement approach, the study consider Zambia’s National SCT scheme as outcome of the structured interaction of different actors with different interests and influence. Based on a qualitative data from over 50 key informant interviews, the study therefore analyses the interactions among top level policy makers as way to comprehend the deep structures of the politics of social protection in Zambia.
Keywords: political economy, targeting, social cash transfers, Zambia
