Democracy and Economic Development
Democracy is a political system in which people can directly elect their leaders. It is a regime in which citizens are free to participate in public affairs, express their opinions and protest against injustices or violations of fundamental rights. It is a regime in which citizens have enforceable legal protection against arbitrary state action and are guaranteed freedom of speech, religion, assembly and association. It is a regime in which political parties, trade unions and other organisations can form to represent the interests of groups in society, such as ethnic or religious groups, women, youths or the elderly.
Democracies are generally perceived to have a number of benefits in comparison with non-democracies, including lower rates of poverty and disease, higher levels of economic growth and greater stability. The development of democratic institutions has been a key driver of economic progress in recent decades, but the democratisation process has proved difficult in many countries where it has emerged, and in some cases it has reversed course into some form of authoritarianism.
A common argument is that to function well, democracies need the consent of citizens, which in turn depends on the legitimacy of the regime. This legitimacy is based on effective performance, which is usually defined in terms of economic development. However, studies of post-World War II Eastern Europe and Latin America have suggested that economic decline does not automatically undermine democracy, and in fact democracies have historically broken down more frequently by elite conspiracies than by popular revolt.
Another approach is that a large middle class promotes democratisation by countering the tendencies of poorer groups to adopt extreme positions on economic, social and political issues. A growing middle class encourages reforms to guarantee economic security and stability, which can generate pressure on even the most repressive governments to make concessions. This is a key factor behind the success of democratic transitions in Latin America, South Korea and India.
There is also a body of research that suggests that a variety of processes activate mechanisms that promote democratisation, such as economic development, reducing inequality and changing networks of trust. Other factors include occasional shocks in the form of conquest, confrontation, colonisation or revolution that speed up these same mechanisms. This kind of explanatory framework requires identification, verification and specification of the relevant causal mechanisms and their conditions for emergence.
Ultimately, a country must achieve civil-society changes that produce substantive democracy in order to be considered a democracy. Without such changes, the attempt to introduce democracy from outside may result in little more than procedural democracy, and that may prove to be ineffective or unsustainable in the long term.
The challenge for theory and research on democratisation is to find ways to identify these causal mechanisms, in order to understand when they work and when they do not. The failure of many third-wave democracies to consolidate and the continuing existence of some forms of authoritarianism in the Muslim Middle East suggest that this is a difficult task, but there are reasons to be hopeful.
Democracy is a political system in which people can directly elect their leaders. It is a regime in which citizens are free to participate in public affairs, express their opinions and protest against injustices or violations of fundamental rights. It is a regime in which citizens have enforceable legal protection against arbitrary state action and are guaranteed freedom of speech, religion, assembly and association. It is a regime in which political parties, trade unions and other organisations can form to represent the interests of groups in society, such as ethnic or religious groups, women, youths or the elderly. Democracies are generally perceived to have a number of benefits in comparison with non-democracies, including lower rates of poverty and disease, higher levels of economic growth and greater stability. The development of democratic institutions has been a key driver of economic progress in recent decades, but the democratisation process has proved difficult in many countries where it has emerged, and in some cases it has reversed course into some form of authoritarianism. A common argument is that to function well, democracies need the consent of citizens, which in turn depends on the legitimacy of the regime. This legitimacy is based on effective performance, which is usually defined in terms of economic development. However, studies of post-World War II Eastern Europe and Latin America have suggested that economic decline does not automatically undermine democracy, and in fact democracies have historically broken down more frequently by elite conspiracies than by popular revolt. Another approach is that a large middle class promotes democratisation by countering the tendencies of poorer groups to adopt extreme positions on economic, social and political issues. A growing middle class encourages reforms to guarantee economic security and stability, which can generate pressure on even the most repressive governments to make concessions. This is a key factor behind the success of democratic transitions in Latin America, South Korea and India. There is also a body of research that suggests that a variety of processes activate mechanisms that promote democratisation, such as economic development, reducing inequality and changing networks of trust. Other factors include occasional shocks in the form of conquest, confrontation, colonisation or revolution that speed up these same mechanisms. This kind of explanatory framework requires identification, verification and specification of the relevant causal mechanisms and their conditions for emergence. Ultimately, a country must achieve civil-society changes that produce substantive democracy in order to be considered a democracy. Without such changes, the attempt to introduce democracy from outside may result in little more than procedural democracy, and that may prove to be ineffective or unsustainable in the long term. The challenge for theory and research on democratisation is to find ways to identify these causal mechanisms, in order to understand when they work and when they do not. The failure of many third-wave democracies to consolidate and the continuing existence of some forms of authoritarianism in the Muslim Middle East suggest that this is a difficult task, but there are reasons to be hopeful.