Public Goods Provision: Is Provider Type Linked to Views of State Legitimacy?

According to social and fiscal contract theories, governments provide core social services largely to maintain their legitimacy. But does the state itself have to provide the services? In most developing countries, both nonprofit and for-profit schools and health clinics exist alongside those of the state. However, limited research has measured the relationship among citizens’ use of these services and attitudes about state legitimacy. This paper examines whether nonstate service provision is associated with decreased government legitimacy. We find a negative relationship between the use of for-profit services and state legitimacy, but no clear relationship between nonprofit service provision and legitimacy, even when controlling for satisfaction with services provided. We propose several explanations for why for-profit service provision could affect legitimacy that are not present in nonprofit services.