Income, inequality, and the stability of democracy — Another look at the Lipset hypothesis

Jung, Florian; Sunde, Uwe

doi:10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2014.03.004

Cited by 26 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 30 publications

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“…First, previous work on political transitions has considered distributional conflicts over economic assets (Acemoglu andRobinson, 2001, 2006;Boix, 2003;Ellis and Fender, 2011;Jung and Sunde, 2014, to name a few), whereas our focus is on institutional conflicts over suppressed economic opportunities. Our theoretical focus is consistent with recent empirical evidence that modern episodes of political liberalization, on average, (i) have not been strongly driven by distributional concerns (Freeman and Quinn, 2012;Haggard and Kaufman, 2012;Houle, 2009;Teorell, 2010); (ii) have led to economic liberalization (De Haan and Sturm, 2003;Fidrmuc, 2003;Rode and Gwartney, 2012), (iii) have led to economic growth (Acemoglu et al, 2014); and (iv) have not reduced income inequality (Acemoglu et al, 2013).…”

Section: Discussion Of Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Inefficient predation and political transitions

Dorsch¹,

Maarek

2015

European Journal of Political Economy

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Section: Discussion Of Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Inefficient predation and political transitions

Dorsch¹,

Maarek

2015

European Journal of Political Economy

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“…For the extension of suffrage to women and how this is related to war see Hicks (2013). See also Jung and Sunde (2014) for a synthesis of how the size and distribution of income may affect the evolution (and breakdown) of democracy. 12 See also Tangeras (2009) for a similar conclusion using a principal-agent framework.…”

Section: A Model Of Democracy and Warmentioning

confidence: 98%

War, disenfranchisement and the fall of the ancient Athenian democracy

Tridimas

2015

European Journal of Political Economy

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The ancient Athenian democracy emerged in 508 (all dates BCE), became a dominant naval power, fought a multitude of external wars and ended in 322 after it was defeated by Macedon and was replaced by oligarchy. The paper employs a political economy framework to examine the demise of democracy. It illustrates that war was a means of redistribution, benefiting the majority of poorer Athenians at the expense of the rich elite, who bore a disproportionate burden of its cost. A model of conflict is set up to study the incentives of the poor majority to go to war. After analyzing a dynamic setting it also investigates the circumstances when after defeating Athens her enemy chooses to impose oligarchy that disenfranchises the poor. As victory at war is probabilistic it is concluded that the fall of the democracy was neither unavoidable nor inevitable.

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“…When scholars attempt to explain the relationship between democracy and inequality, they stress the impact of democratic rule on resource distribution rather than vice versus (Huber and Stephens 2012;Acemoglu et al 2013). Some scholars have begun to rekindle the classics' interest pondering the extent to which levels of social inequality can be sustained within a liberal democracy (Stiglitz 2012;Wade 2013;Bartels 2016;Jung and Sunde 2014;Kang 2015). In the most general terms, the literature maintains that inequality is hurtful to democratic governance in both developed and post-transitional political systems (Fukuyama, Diamond, and Plattner 2012).…”

Section: Democratic Governance and Income Inequalitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Does inequality erode generalized trust? Evidence from Romanian youths

Sum

Bădescu

2018

Acta Polit

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Generalized trust is a critical component of liberal democratic citizenship. We evaluate the extent to which exposure to socioeconomic inequality erodes trust among Romanian youths. Using national survey data of Romanian eighth-grade and high school students, we evaluate this effect as a product of socioeconomic diversity within the classroom, controlling for the social status of the students as well as socioeconomic inequality within the community where the school is located. Our analysis shows that generalized trust is higher for students in higher grades. However, despite this maturing effect, students exposed to greater levels of socioeconomic diversity have significantly lower levels of trust. The effect is particularly acute for students in the ninth grade. This finding holds when controlling for socioeconomic diversity and polarization in the community. The result reinforces the idea that generalized trust develops early in one's life and is quite stable, although a major life transformation, such as entering high school, may alter trust depending on the social context.

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Income, inequality, and the stability of democracy — Another look at the Lipset hypothesis

Cited by 26 publications

References 30 publications

Inefficient predation and political transitions

Inefficient predation and political transitions

War, disenfranchisement and the fall of the ancient Athenian democracy

Does inequality erode generalized trust? Evidence from Romanian youths

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