Unprincipled Principals in the Accountability Chain: Autonomy and Political Control Within Tax Administration in a Developing Country Context

ABSTRACT

SDG 16 emphasizes the need for accountable institutions, often based on the assumption that public officials are accountable to politicians, who in turn are accountable to citizens. However, in many developing countries, neopatrimonial governance can weaken this accountability chain, as politicians themselves may act as “unprincipled principals,” limiting citizens’ ability to hold them to account and exercising informal political control over bureaucracies. In this context, Semi‐Autonomous Revenue Authorities (SARAs) have been promoted as a means to enhance the independence of tax administrations and therefore, address the “unprincipled principals” problem. However, the extent to which they achieve these objectives and how accountability can be strengthened in such environments remains uncertain. This study examines the case of Nigeria's Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), a SARA, through the lens of Bersch and Fukuyama's theory of bureaucratic autonomy, treating autonomy not as a separate construct but as a structural condition of accountability. Drawing on documentary evidence and interviews with revenue officials, taxpayers, and tax professionals, we show how accountability is practiced in a context shaped by neopatrimonialism. Our findings contribute to debates in accountability and public administration by demonstrating how organizational façades sustained through symbolic compliance, informal control, and hybrid institutional arrangements enable political actors to hollow out formal accountability structures while preserving their appearance. It also offers several implications for policy and practice in developing countries seeking to strengthen public accountability.