ABSTRACT
Randomized evaluations of policies in developing countries have become very popular in recent years, increasing in both the number and diversity of tests carried out. It is possible to include in this field of enquiry experiments that are oriented more to political science, such as studies of political participation and the responsiveness of elites in these countries, which are also growing in frequency (see De La O and Wantchekon 2011). Such a profusion makes what is about to be covered truly enormous. Given the diverse nature of the countries involved, which have different cultures and levels of economic development, as well as interventions across so many fields of activity, it might have been more appropriate to have included these topics in functional fields covered in other chapters, such as trials about welfare and employment, or ones on elites. The reason for a separate chapter is because these trials have some special features, which raise different sets of practical problems and advantages from the experiments covered so far.
