Does Institutional Quality Drive Infrastructural Development? Evidence from Nigeria

Iloafunsi, Miriam Chinenye and ANOWOR, OLUCHUKWU F (2026) Does Institutional Quality Drive Infrastructural Development? Evidence from Nigeria. International Journal of Social Sciences and Management Research, 12 (3). pp. 24-45. ISSN 2545-5303

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Abstract

Nigeria's persistent infrastructure deficit amid considerable resource wealth constitutes a compelling developmental paradox that demands institutional explanation. This study empirically investigates whether institutional quality drives infrastructural development in Nigeria over the period 1986–2024, anchored within the New Institutional Economics framework. Employing the Autoregressive Distributed Lag bounds testing approach alongside Granger causality analysis, and operationalizing institutional quality through the World Bank's six-dimensional Worldwide Governance Indicators framework, the study establishes three principal findings. First, institutional quality exerts a positive and statistically significant impact on infrastructural development in both the short run (4.51%) and long run (3.82%), confirming governance quality as a structural determinant of infrastructure outcomes. Second, while government capital expenditure independently promotes infrastructure development, its productive complementarity with institutional quality remains constrained by deep-seated governance inefficiencies. Third, no statistically significant short-run causal relationship exists between the two variables, suggesting their nexus is structurally cointegrated rather than directionally causal. These findings position institutional reform, not financing expansion, as the foundational precondition for sustainable infrastructural development in Nigeria.

Item Type: Article
Subjects: A General Works > AS Academies and learned societies (General)
Divisions: Faculty of Arts > Faculty of Law > Faculty of Management and Social Sciences > Faculty of Education
Depositing User: Uchenna Eneogwe
Date Deposited: 07 May 2026 15:08
Last Modified: 07 May 2026 15:08
URI: http://eprints.gouni.edu.ng/id/eprint/5655

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