Mershon, Carol. "What effect do local political elites have on infant and child death? Elected and chiefly authority in South Africa." Social Science & Medicine 251(2020): 112902.

Mershon argues that traditional authority has local power and the potential to affect public goods. She questions how electoral pressure and chiefly authority affect social welfare by examining the response of traditional authority in supplying public goods such as pipe born water and sanitation services in South Africa as political elites invest and implement public goods and service delivery. The fact that political elites can determine where and who gets access to drinking water for example, gives room for political manipulation. As more and more African countries seek to grow their democracies, traditional leaders who are mostly unelected elites also serve as vote brokers for party politicians and in turn get to control the provision of public goods in their communities. Mershon describes the relationship between the African ‘local’ voters and their chiefs as complex, based on reciprocity and to some extent, exploitation. In Mershon’s study she finds out that the majority of black African households in S.A were more likely to face child or infant mortality under the age of five. Where the chiefs are strong(influential,) the mortality rate was much lower. Also, households in districts where voter turnout was high, had a relatively lower probability of infant and child death. Most significantly, her study showed that where the ANC party dominance coincides with strong chiefly authority, voter turnout rises and thereby reduces the likelihood of infant and child deaths.