In developing countries, access to opportunities within the private sector are often unequally distributed. Advantages accrue to those with connections to the state or to those with privileged social status. The magnitude and location of where these factors precisely make an impact are less understood, however. In this project, I locate precisely where leakages occur by causally estimating the impact of political and social determinants of access to private sector development under unevenly enforced rule of law. I do so by implementing a field experiment in Senegal in which I create a registered business and randomise co-partisanship and gender during entrepreneurs’ applications for valuable business permits at municipal councils. I find that co-partisan applicants deal with fewer steps in the application process and are more likely to successfully deposit their applications. Women are more likely to have their applications rejected immediately, despite following the same procedures as men. Once deposited, however, applications have an equally probable chance of conditional acceptance, suggesting that the initial point of access is where political and social factors are most valuable. By highlighting the specific areas along the institutional pathway where partisanship and gender are most influential, this study offers causal evidence to inform policy in reducing the barriers that entrepreneurs, particularly women, face in developing countries.
