There were no differences according to gender: male and females have the same views on all
the indices. However, there were differences due to age. Interestingly, younger Zimbabweans
saw that there was good service availability, but not so service delivery. Older Zimbabweans
were distinguished by having higher Social Capital and greater Political Trust.
When we asked the question about residence, then our working hypotheses were tested more
clearly.
Table 3:
Service
availability
Service
delivery
Lived Poverty
Social Capital
Support for
democracy
Political trust
Responsiveness
Urban
[n=448]
Rural
[n=752]
8.00
3.86
1198
28.02
0.0000
3.86
4.44
1198
-2.76
0.0058
2.56
1.85
2.94
2.70
1198
1198
-4.53
-11.58
0.0000
0.0000
1.46
1.54
1198
-1.34
ns
0.99
1.30
1.33
1.96
1198
1198
-3.86
-7.17
0.0001
0.0000
df
t
Sig. 2tailed
Our hypotheses were not wholly confirmed as seen in Table 3. Lived Poverty was greater in
rural than urban residents, but also Service Delivery, Social Capital, Political Trust and State
Responsiveness. Urban residents saw Service Availability as greater in the urban areas, which
is not surprising, but it is perhaps not obvious that Service Availability and Service Delivery
were not correlated (Table 2). Thus, we conclude as follows:
Lived Poverty (LP) was higher in rural as opposed to urban residents (hypothesis
disconfirmed);
Service Availability (SA) was greater in urban as opposed to rural areas (hypothesis
confirmed);
Service Delivery (SD) was not better in urban as opposed to rural areas (hypothesis
disconfirmed);
Social Capital (SC) was higher in rural areas (hypothesis confirmed);
Support for Democracy (Dem) was not significantly different (hypothesis
disconfirmed);
Political Trust (PT) was higher in rural areas (hypothesis confirmed);
State Responsiveness (SR) was higher in rural areas (hypothesis confirmed).
Conclusions
Once again we find the “rural factor” operating in understanding how Zimbabweans view their
world. It is hardly a new understanding that Lived Poverty is greater in rural compared to urban
areas, and perhaps reassuring that both groups value democracy, but some of these findings are
counter-intuitive at first glance.
It would seem generally that Service Availability and Delivery should be related: why should
there be poorer delivery when there is greater availability? The answer would seem to lie in the
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