Jishnu Das of Georgetown University reviews “Accelerating India’s Development: A State-Led Roadmap for Effective Governance” by Karthik Muralidharan. The Econlit abstract of this book begins: “Explores ways of improving the functioning of Indian governance and accelerating its development, focusing on state-level governance and the delivery of public services.”

We estimate and validate test score–based measures of school quality (school value added, or SVA) in Pakistan. We document substantial variation in SVA within villages and within the public and private sectors, leading to a wide range of possible estimates of the private premium. We also show that parents value SVA. Heterogeneity in parental demand for quality helps explain both the evolution of the market over time and cross-market variation in school quality. The supply side responds to parental demand for quality in the private sector, but there is no evidence it does so in the public sector.