Program > Papers by author > Geys Benny

Political Donations and the Allocation of Public Procurement Contracts
Vítězslav Titl  1@  , Benny Geys  2@  
1 : Catholic University of Leuven  (KU Leuven)  -  Website
Oude Markt 13 - bus 5005, 3000 Leuven -  Belgium
2 : BI Norwegian Business School [Oslo]  -  Website
Nydalsveien 37, 0484 Oslo, Norway -  Norway

We study whether and when firms' donations to political parties induce favouritism in public procurement allocations. Our analysis builds on a unique, comprehensive dataset covering all public procurement contracts and all corporate donations to major political parties in the Czech Republic over the period 2007-2014, and exploits changes in political control over regional governments within this period for identication purposes. We find that firms donating 10% more to a political party gaining (losing) power witness an increase (decrease) in the value of their public procurement contracts by 0.5 to 0.6%. Importantly, however, these gains from political donations only arise for contracts allocated under less restrictive procurement allocation processes. Politicians' discretionary power thus presents a crucial moderating factor for the impact of political donations on the procurement process.


Online user: 1