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Paper short abstract

This study examines how informality shapes citizenship practice in Lagos, Nigeria

Paper long abstract

Residents routinely make demands on the government for public services, but they often rely on local intermediaries to gain access to the state. Yet we still know little about who is most likely to make claims, why they turn to certain intermediaries over others, and what motivates them to act in the first place. This paper examines these questions using an original household survey of local governance processes in Lagos, Nigeria. The survey covers 20 diverse neighborhoods across the city—varying by income level and core–periphery location—and includes 800 respondents. It captures variation in claims-making across multiple public services, including water, sanitation, security, employment, and housing, and incorporates governance arenas beyond the state, such as traditional authorities, religious leaders, and non-state service providers. The analysis emphasizes how scale shapes citizenship pathways; settlement history structures patterns of authority and intermediation, and; place attachments motivate claims-making and collective action. By leveraging fine-grained neighborhood variation, the paper advances the panel’s broader comparative agenda on how informality shapes political access in the Global South.