Imams and Patrons: Service Provision by Islamist Non-State Actors

Whether armed or unarmed, Islamist non-state actors have a reputation for winning over citizens’ support and spreading their ideas through service delivery, reflecting a worldwide trend in non-state service provision. While existing research attributes the notable variation in service provision to strategic targeting, we argue that service allocation is also highly dependent on a non-state actor’s ability to marshal resources through local economic elites. Our findings demonstrate that service provision by religious non-state actors is more likely in areas and periods where there is associational involvement among elite supporters at the local level. For our inferences, we examine the spatial and temporal variation in the service delivery of a major Islamist group in Turkey. We use original data on non-state service infrastructure, local business associations, charitable endowments, and economic development, as proxied by average nightlight density, along with data on public service infrastructure and historical state-building institutions.