Balán, Pablo, Augustin Bergeron, Gabriel Tourek, and Jonathan L. Weigel. "Local Elites as State Capacity: How City Chiefs Use Local Information to Increase Tax Compliance in the Democratic Republic of the Congo." American Economic Review 112, no. 3 (2022): 762-97.

The authors question whether local and traditional elites are an impediment or an asset to development of a state, and whether local elites can collaborate with the state to improve on governance and public service delivery especially in fragile states. The paper investigates the relationship between local elites and the state as it seeks to raise revenue through taxation.