Is democracy about redistribution?

Abstract

Some scholars champion broad conceptualizations of democracy where distribution of economic resources is an integral part, whereas several prominent arguments drawing on narrower conceptualizations of democracy still assume that progressive redistribution is central to democratic politics. We empirically analyse individual opinions on whether progressive taxation and redistribution are among democracy's central characteristics. While many citizens around the world associate democracy with redistribution, we find that surprisingly few consider redistribution among the most central characteristics of democracy. We further analyse what factors affect individuals’ propensity to consider redistribution among democracy's most important features. Running multi-level models, we find that having lived under a communist regime and − although less robust – currently living under democracy make individuals less likely to hold this notion. However, individuals with more to gain from progressive redistribution (that is, little education and belonging to lower classes) are more likely to hold it. We discuss how our findings help shed light on two puzzles in comparative politics; (I) why do democracies not promote more redistributive policies than autocracies, and (II) why is there no net relationship between income inequality and democratization

Democratization and the Conditional Dynamics of Income Distribution

“…Furthermore, the mechanism that drives reductions in inequality in the high inequality countries is not direct fiscal redistribution, as supposed by the redistributionist models of transition. The result that democratization does not affect inequality through a purely redistributive channel is consistent with an emerging literature that suggests that the primary motive for democratization is not purely redistributionist (Aidt and Jensen 2009; Ansell and Samuels 2014; Haggard and Kaufman 2012; Knutsen and Wegmann 2016). However, the fact that highly unequal countries become more equal through other fiscal mechanisms or due to changes in economic empowerment does not invalidate the mechanism highlighted by previous models in which inequality is the grievance.…”

“…2 Employing fixed-effects dynamic panel regression models, Acemoglu et al (2015) go on to show that there is no robust statistically significant relation between democratization and inequality. Such null results accord with recent reconsiderations of the extent to which drivers of democratization are distributive in nature (Aidt and Jensen 2009; Haggard and Kaufman 2012; Kaufman 2009; Keefer 2009; Knutsen and Wegmann 2016).…”

Growing up in the Third Wave: democratic transitions and support for redistribution

“…First taxonomized by Dahl (1972), the idea of democracy as a varied, multidimensional concept has been reinvigorated by new approaches using cross-national survey data. (Knutsen and Wegmann 2016, Ulbricht 2018, Davis et al 2020.…”

“…Though the distributive implications of democracy feature prominently in theories of regime change (e.g. Dahl 1968, Boix 2003, Acemoglu and Robinson 2006, Knutsen and Wegmann (2016) find that only a small minority of respondents (19-25% depending on the measure) actually think that democracy is about redistribution from rich to poor. I use the same data as they do, but extend the time series and focus only on Third Wave countries.…”

Is there a decline of democracy in the EU between 2004 and 2016? The relevance of data selection: a replication study of Smolka (2021) and comparison of democracy measures

“…In contrast to the DeMaX, which is based exclusively on V-Dem's expert ratings, the DB also integrates surveys into its measurement. The validity of these indicators is problematic, as it is not clear whether they actually measure what they are supposed to and, moreover, their cross-cultural comparability is questionable (Ariely and Davidov 2012;Knutsen and Wegmann 2016). 5 In addition, the DB also uses indicators that adopt the meaning of the quality of democracy in terms of results (see Diamond and Morlino 2004).…”