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Political parties in Africa and other developing countries are known to forge clientelist rather than programmatic ties to voters. Yet this does not mean that parties reward strong legislator-voter ties. In this paper, I argue for the case of Nigeria that lawmakers seeking to advance their political careers are incentivized to direct public resources to party members and senior party elites rather than serve their constituents in general. I draw on interviews with 8th National Assembly (2015–2019) lawmakers as well as quantitative data on MP re-election, targeted bills and motions, and the use of constituency development funds to demonstrate the predominance of narrow clientelism in Nigeria. I also place the Nigerian case in comparative perspective to argue that the extent to which legislators devote attention to constituents is likely to exist on a continuum, with the causes and consequences of this variation requiring further attention from scholars.

Abstract
Since independence, Nigeria has adopted federalism to manage the country's deep ethno-regional divisions, but federalism has not averted instability and return to military rule in the past. This highlights the need for additional factors and mechanisms to secure and stabilize civilian rule in Nigeria. The country's ethnic party ban ensures that parties in power have a broad basis across the territory. Theoretically, these "integrated" parties are often argued to foster intergroup compromise and political stability. Yet in our case study of intergroup relations in Nigeria's National Assembly, we demonstrate that the country's broad-based parties do not play a strong role in organizing intergroup cooperation. Despite this, the Assembly has not experienced substantial policy gridlock. We argue that instead of integrated parties, ethno-regional balancing (i.e., a practice whereby key positions in parliament are allocated to different groupings) is a much more important stabilizing factor in Nigeria's federal parliament.

How does interethnic marriage influence the occurrence of ethnic violence in sub-Saharan Africa? Previous studies on the relationship between intergroup contact and conflict onset have produced mixed findings. Some scholars have argued that this might be due to the way interethnic contact is measured. Building on insights of social psychology, this study examines the influence of interethnic marriage as the ultimate form of positive intergroup contact. In doing so, we combine information of the Demographic and Health Surveys with event data on ethnic conflict. Our analysis shows that areas with higher levels of exogamy significantly experience less ethnic conflict.