Democratic institutions and the energy intensity of well-being: a cross-national study

Abstract

Background: Energy consumption is necessary for human well-being, yet the growth of energy consumption also contributes to climate change and a range of negative externalities. Thus, a key sustainability challenge is to efficiently use energy consumption to promote human well-being. This manuscript contributes to the growing literature on the ecological intensity of well-being (EIWB) by modeling the relationship between democratic institutions and the energy intensity of well-being. Methods: We use international data to understand how democratic institutions-understood as a combination of elected legislature, elected executives, and democratic competition-impact the energy intensity of well-being. The energy intensity of well-being is an adjusted ratio of energy consumption and life expectancy. We combine randomintercept mixed-effect models with entropy balancing constraints to create covariate balance between democracies and non-democracies. Results: Contrary to our expectations, we find that consistently null results suggesting that democracies do not leverage their energy consumption to improve well-being more effectively than other systems of government. Democracy and its subcomponents do not appear to improve, or reduce, the energy intensity of well-being. Conclusions: Democracy does not appear to improve sustainability, operationalized as the energy intensity of well-being. On the other hand, democracies do not appear to do worse than non-democracies, suggesting democratization can spread without reducing sustainability.

Social Science Perspectives on Drivers of and Responses to Global Climate Change

“…Findings suggest that the effect of GDP per capita on CIWB is relatively large, positive, and stable in magnitude through time for nations in North America, Europe, and Oceania, and has increased in magnitude through time for nations in the other regional samples of nations (Jorgenson 2014; see also Dietz 2015;Dietz et al , 2012Mayer 2017;Mazur and Rosa 1974).…”

Modeling the Impact of Political Institutions on Energy Security: Evidence from High-Income Countries

“…For instance, Adom (2016) suggested that it is challenging for countries to emerge from an energy-inefficient condition due to broken institutions, inadequate infrastructure, weak regulatory systems, and entrenched corruption. Further research on the impact of democratic institutions on well-energy being's intensity by Mayer (2017) revealed that democracy does not seem to increase energy intensity. Deacon (2009) discovered that non-democratic governments often provide access to public assets like energy infrastructure at costs that are far higher than those of democratic organizations.…”

Measurement of the Energy Intensity of Human Well-Being and Spatial Econometric Analysis of Its Influencing Factors

“…Therefore, it is necessary to subtract a constant from the numerator to balance the variation coefficient of the numerator and the denominator. This method is widely used in the studies of EIWB [30,31]. The basic mathematical basis for this is that subtracting a constant from the numerator reduces the mean without changing the standard deviation of the numerator, thereby equalizing the variation coefficients in the numerator and denominator.…”