Rural Sociology of Village Water Point Committee Maintenance Levy Arrears and Shared Tap Disconnection in Tanzanian Village Assemblies: A Regression Discontinuity Analysis of Arrears Thresholds

Village water point committees in Tanzania enforce maintenance levy compliance through a shared tap disconnection rule that triggers once a household's arrears cross a publicly announced threshold. the present analysis treats that threshold as a sociological institution rather than a mere billing parameter and asks what a regression discontinuity design can and cannot identify about its effects on disconnection and subsequent payment. Because no observational data are available, the paper characterises the operating characteristics of the design under a declared variance structure: between-cluster standard deviation of 6.0, residual standard deviation of 4.5, and an intraclass correlation of 0.64. Power was estimated across 2000 replications per design cell for cluster counts of 8, 16, 24 and 32 and effect sizes of 3, 5 and 8 percentage points.52 clusters are required to detect a 5 percentage point effect at 80 per cent power, that the minimum detectable effect falls steeply as clusters increase from 8 to 32, and that the high intraclass correlation of 0.64 makes village-level clustering the binding constraint on precision. The arrears threshold is a socially produced cut-point whose legitimacy depends on collective recognition, and that credible estimation of its effects requires designs that respect the clustered, assembly-mediated structure of the disconnection decision.