Awakening Leviathan: The effect of democracy on state capacity

Abstract

Recent debates over the relative importance of democracy and state capacity for human development have led to the prevailing view that a strong state must be built before the introduction of democracy. Our research challenges this "sequencing approach" in international development. Using a global panel of countries over 50 years, we document that democracy has a substantial, positive causal effect on state capacity with identification strategies that adjust for pre-treatment dynamics. The state-enhancing effect of democracy is robust to alternative measures of key variables, a large set of time-varying confounders and an instrumental variable design that leverages variation in regional democratic diffusions. Subsequent analysis suggests contestation, rather than participation, as a potential causal mechanism. Our findings contribute to the burgeoning literature on sources of state capacity in the developing world and yield practical implications for democracy assistance.

Stairways to Denmark: Does the Sequence of State-Building and Democratization Matter for Economic Development?

“…This creates another, albeit indirect, incentive for democratic politicians to build state capacity. A handful of large-n studies have tested for a relationship between democracy and state capacity, mostly reporting a positive association (Adzera et al, 2003;Bäck and Hadenius, 2008;Carbone and Memoli, 2015;Wang and Xu, 2018). While these findings run counter to the assumption undergirding the stateness-first argument, we note that some recent studies have added qualifications, suggesting that democracy may only enhance capacity in rich-country contexts (Charron and Lapuente, 2010) or that competitive elections enhance capacity whereas suffrage expansions may have the opposite effect (Andersen and Cornell, 2018).…”

Narrative of Governance Crisis in Nigeria: Allegories of Resource Curse and ‘Emergence’ from Tunde Kelani’s Saworoide and Agogo-Èèwọ

“…The above conversation leave no one in doubt about the defining factors that led to the overthrow of King Lapite, bearing striking similitude with Wang and Xu (2018) submission that autocratic regimes are often susceptible to violent overthrow.…”

“…Nevertheless, the movies also anchored into submissions of authors on the need to diversify from over-dependence on resource income to avoid rentier economy. While we tend to agree Wang and Xu (2018) that popular regimes might reduce resource curse in rentier states, diversifying from extractive sector broad tax regimes of the real sectors of the economy (Olaiya, 2011) suggests a more enduring solution to governance crisis. The denouement to the movies, essentially performed in Agogo Eewo, placed more emphasis on leadership-making process, which might in turn serve as panacea for governance crisis.…”

“…There is no doubt that that these kinds of power plays are strikingly similar to specific events in Nigerian politics. As Wang and Xu (2018) pointed out, democratic practices are robust predictors of development and a significant disincentive to military overthrowing of democratic regimes. In 1979In , 1993, the military and political elites colluded to install President Shehu Shagari, President Ernest Shonekan and President Olusegun Obasanjo, respectively, against the popular wishes of the people (Emenyeonu, 1997;Human Right Watch, 2007).…”

Institutional foundations of global well-being: Democracy, state capacity and social protection

“…The general conclusion has been that over time, democracy enhances the state's ability to act effectively; the reason being that freedom of opinion and of the press, combined with independent legal/administrative organs of control, put intense pressure on state officials to perform well because if they do not, they risk losing their positions (e.g. B€ ack and Hadenius, 2008;Wang and Xu, 2018). We presumed that the same logic would be manifested in the current study: high degrees of democratic performance would promote state capacity.…”