What makes democracies endure?

Journal of Democracy

Volumn 7, Issue 1, 1996, Pages

  Przeworski, Adam ^a   Alvarez, Michael ^b   Cheibub, José Antonio ^c   Limongi, Fernando ^d  

^a NEW YORK UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^b DEPAUL UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^c UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA   (United States)

^d UNIVERSITY OF SÃO PAULO   (Brazil)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0242346366     PISSN: 10455736     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (40)

1. Most of the political data were collected by the authors, but some are taken from Arthur S. Banks, Cross-National Time-Series Data Archive (Binghamton, N.Y.: Center for Social Analysis, State University of New York at Binghamton, magnetic tape, 1993). They are described in Alvarez, Cheibub, Limongi, and Przeworski, "Classifying Political Regimes for the ACLP Data Set" (Working Paper No. 3, University of Chicago Center on Democracy, 1994). Most of the economic data are derived from Penn World Tables, version 5.6; other data are from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. We refer to this collection of data as the ACLP data base. Saudi Arabia and the five Persian Gulf states were excluded because oil revenues accounted for more than 50 percent of their GDP most of the time.
2. These numbers add up to 104 democratic institutional systems since there were three democratic regimes that changed their institutional framework without passing through a dictatorial spell.
3. Adam Przeworski and Fernando Limongi, "Democracy and Development" (paper presented at the Nobel Symposium on Democracy, Uppsala, Sweden, 27-30 August 1994). For divergent assessments of how regimes affect growth, see the overview presented in Przeworski and Limongi, "Political Regimes and Economic Growth," Journal of Economic Perspectives 1 (1993): 51-69. For recent econometric evidence, see John F. Helliwell, "Empirical Linkages Between Democracy and Economic Growth," British Journal of Political Science 24 (1993): 225-48; Robert J. Barro, "Democracy and Growth" (Working Paper No. 4909, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, Mass., 1994).
4. Adam Przeworski and Fernando Limongi, "Democracy and Development" (paper presented at the Nobel Symposium on Democracy, Uppsala, Sweden, 27-30 August 1994). For divergent assessments of how regimes affect growth, see the overview presented in Przeworski and Limongi, "Political Regimes and Economic Growth," Journal of Economic Perspectives 1 (1993): 51-69. For recent econometric evidence, see John F. Helliwell, "Empirical Linkages Between Democracy and Economic Growth," British Journal of Political Science 24 (1993): 225-48; Robert J. Barro, "Democracy and Growth" (Working Paper No. 4909, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, Mass., 1994).
5. Adam Przeworski and Fernando Limongi, "Democracy and Development" (paper presented at the Nobel Symposium on Democracy, Uppsala, Sweden, 27-30 August 1994). For divergent assessments of how regimes affect growth, see the overview presented in Przeworski and Limongi, "Political Regimes and Economic Growth," Journal of Economic Perspectives 1 (1993): 51-69. For recent econometric evidence, see John F. Helliwell, "Empirical Linkages Between Democracy and Economic Growth," British Journal of Political Science 24 (1993): 225-48; Robert J. Barro, "Democracy and Growth" (Working Paper No. 4909, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, Mass., 1994).
6. Adam Przeworski and Fernando Limongi, "Democracy and Development" (paper presented at the Nobel Symposium on Democracy, Uppsala, Sweden, 27-30 August 1994). For divergent assessments of how regimes affect growth, see the overview presented in Przeworski and Limongi, "Political Regimes and Economic Growth," Journal of Economic Perspectives 1 (1993): 51-69. For recent econometric evidence, see John F. Helliwell, "Empirical Linkages Between Democracy and Economic Growth," British Journal of Political Science 24 (1993): 225-48; Robert J. Barro, "Democracy and Growth" (Working Paper No. 4909, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, Mass., 1994).
7. All figures for annual per-capita income are expressed in purchasing power parity (PPP) U.S. dollars in 1985 international prices, as given by version 5.5 of the Penn World Tables. In some cases, these numbers differ significantly from the 5.6 release, used in the remainder of this paper to measure the "level of development."
8. The results reported in this paragraph are treated at length in Adam Przeworski and Fernando Limongi, "Modernization: Theories and Facts" (Working Paper No. 8, University of Chicago Center on Democracy, 1995).
9. After the fact, it may appear that development led to democracy. Suppose that we observe a dictatorship with a per-capita income of $2,000 a year in a country that grows at 2.5 percent per year. Assume further that at $2,000 any dictatorship faces each year the same risk of dying, equal to 0.025. If this dictatorship died exactly 28 years after its birth, at $4,000, we would be tempted to attribute its demise to development. But this dictatorial regime would have had a 50 percent cumulative chance of making it all the way to $4,000 even if the marginal chance of surviving (the hazard rate) was exactly the same at $4,000 as at $2,000. Conversely, take Spain, which we observe for the first time in 1950 at $1,953 per-capita income and which grew under the dictatorship at the average rate of 5.25 percent per annum, to reach $7,531 by 1976. Suppose that the Spanish dictatorship faced during the entire period a 0.03 chance of dying during each year, so that, assuming an exponential hazard function, it had about a 50 percent chance of not being around by 1974 even if it had not developed at all.
10. Samuel P. Huntington, Political Order in Changing Societies (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968); Samuel P. Huntington and Joan Nelson, No Easy Choice: Political Participation in Developing Countries (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976); and Guillermo O'Donnell, Modernization and Bureaucratic-Authoritarianism: Studies in South American Politics (Berkeley: Institute of International Studies, University of California, 1973).
11. Samuel P. Huntington, Political Order in Changing Societies (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968); Samuel P. Huntington and Joan Nelson, No Easy Choice: Political Participation in Developing Countries (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976); and Guillermo O'Donnell, Modernization and Bureaucratic-Authoritarianism: Studies in South American Politics (Berkeley: Institute of International Studies, University of California, 1973).
12. Samuel P. Huntington, Political Order in Changing Societies (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968); Samuel P. Huntington and Joan Nelson, No Easy Choice: Political Participation in Developing Countries (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976); and Guillermo O'Donnell, Modernization and Bureaucratic-Authoritarianism: Studies in South American Politics (Berkeley: Institute of International Studies, University of California, 1973).
13. In addition to the transitions in Argentina in 1955, 1962, 1966, and 1976, they occurred in Chile in 1973, Uruguay in 1973, Suriname in 1980, Turkey in 1967, and Fiji in 1987.
14. Seymour Martin Lipset, "Some Social Requisites of Democracy: Economic Development and Political Legitimacy," American Political Science Review 53 (1959): 56. Our best guess is that the European countries which succumbed to fascism between the wars had per-capita incomes not higher than $2,000 in the 1985 international prices. See Przeworski and Limongi (1995).
15. Lipset, Political Man: The Social Bases of Politics (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981 [orig. publ. 1960]), esp. 27-63, 459-76, and 488-503; Mancur Olson, "Rapid Growth as a Destabilizing Force," Journal of Economic History 23 (1963): 453-72; and Huntington, Political Order in Changing Societies.
16. Lipset, Political Man: The Social Bases of Politics (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981 [orig. publ. 1960]), esp. 27-63, 459-76, and 488-503; Mancur Olson, "Rapid Growth as a Destabilizing Force," Journal of Economic History 23 (1963): 453-72; and Huntington, Political Order in Changing Societies.
17. Lipset, Political Man: The Social Bases of Politics (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981 [orig. publ. 1960]), esp. 27-63, 459-76, and 488-503; Mancur Olson, "Rapid Growth as a Destabilizing Force," Journal of Economic History 23 (1963): 453-72; and Huntington, Political Order in Changing Societies.
18. This finding parallels again the results of John B. Londregan and Keith T. Poole with regard to coups, which they found to be less likely when the economy grows. See Londregan and Poole, "Poverty, the Coup Trap, and the Seizure of Executive Power," World Politics 42 (1990): 151-83.
19. Larry Diamond and Juan J. Linz, "Introduction: Politics, Democracy, and Society in Latin America," in Diamond, Linz, and Lipset, eds., Democracy in Developing Countries: Latin America (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner, 1989).
20. Hirschman's argument was that a moderate rate of inflation allows governments to pacify the most militant groups. See "The Social and Political Matrix of Inflation: Elaborations on the Latin American Experience," in Essays in Trespassing: Economics to Politics and Beyond (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 177-207.
21. Edward N. Muller, "Democracy, Economic Development, and Income Inequality," American Sociological Review 53 (1988): 50-68.
22. Note again the parallel finding of Londregan and Poole in "Poverty, the Coup Trap, and the Seizure of Executive Power" that coups breed coups.
23. Juan J. Linz, "The Perils of Presidentialism," Journal of Democracy 1 (Winter 1990): 51-69 and "The Virtues of Parliamentarism," Journal of Democracy 1 (Fall 1990): 84-91.
24. Juan J. Linz, "The Perils of Presidentialism," Journal of Democracy 1 (Winter 1990): 51-69 and "The Virtues of Parliamentarism," Journal of Democracy 1 (Fall 1990): 84-91.
25. Juan J. Linz, "Democracy: Presidential or Parliamentary - Does It Make a Difference?" (paper prepared for the Workshop on Political Parties in the Southern Cone, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington, D.C., 1984). Linz's claim is disputed by Scott Mainwaring and Matthew Shugart, "Juan Linz, Presidentialism, and Democracy: A Critical Appraisal" (Working Paper No. 200, Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies, University of Notre Dame, 1993).
26. Juan J. Linz, "Democracy: Presidential or Parliamentary - Does It Make a Difference?" (paper prepared for the Workshop on Political Parties in the Southern Cone, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington, D.C., 1984). Linz's claim is disputed by Scott Mainwaring and Matthew Shugart, "Juan Linz, Presidentialism, and Democracy: A Critical Appraisal" (Working Paper No. 200, Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies, University of Notre Dame, 1993).
27. Walter Bagehot, "The English Constitution: The Cabinet," in Arend Lijphart, ed., Parliamentary Versus Presidential Government (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), 18. Woodrow Wilson's 1884 essay "Committee or Cabinet Government?" -reprinted in the same volume-makes an argument similar to Bagehot's. Also to be found in Lijphart's collection is an analysis of the U.S. political structure done to mark the 1976 Bicentennial by the U.S. Committee on the Constitutional System. The Committee notes that "The separation of powers, as a principle of constitutional structure, has served us well in preventing tyranny and the abuse of high office, but it has done so by encouraging confrontation, and deadlock, and by diffusing accountability for the results."
28. Note that throughout we refer only to the share of the largest party in the legislature, whether or not it has been the same as the party of the president. In the United States, since 1968, the control of at least one house of the Congress has rested in the hands of the party other than that of the president 80 percent of the time.
29. Mainwaring counted democratic breakdowns since 1945, finding 27 under presidentialism, 19 under parliamentarism, and 4 under other types. "Presidentialism, Multipartism, and Democracy: The Difficult Combination," Comparative Political Studies 26 (1993): 198-228.
30. Mainwaring, "Presidentialism in Latin America," Latin American Research Review 25 (1990): 157-79. Alfred Stepan and Cindy Skach, "Meta-Instilutional Frameworks and Democratic Consolidation," World Politics 46 (1993): 1-22.
31. Mainwaring, "Presidentialism in Latin America," Latin American Research Review 25 (1990): 157-79. Alfred Stepan and Cindy Skach, "Meta-Instilutional Frameworks and Democratic Consolidation," World Politics 46 (1993): 1-22.
32. Mainwaring and Shugart, in "Juan Linz, Presidentialism, and Democracy," take issue with Linz: in their view it is majoritarian parliamentarism, rather than presidentialism, that increases the political stakes. Yet even if majoritarian parliamentary systems last shorter than minoritarian ones, parliamentary democracies of any kind last longer than presidential regimes. Whether this difference is due to the intensity of political conflicts, however, we do not know.
33. Only Pakistan went from parliamentarism in 1950-55 to presidentialism in 1972-76 and back to parliamentarism in 1988. Only Ghana, Nigeria, South Korea (which was a parliamentary democracy for one year in 1960), and Turkey chose a presidential system after having experienced parliamentary democracies. Lastly, only Suriname opted for a mixed system after having experienced democratic presidentialism.
34. This is the argument of the Nigerian Constitution Drafting Committee of 1976: "The tendency indeed of all people throughout the world is to elevate a single person to the position of ruler. In the context of Africa the division [of powers] is not only meaningless, it is difficult to maintain in practice. No African head of state has been known to be content with the position of a mere figurehead." See the Committee's report in Lijphart, Parliamentary Versus Presidential Government.
35. Only two parliamentary democracies emerged from a civilian dictatorship and died before 1991. Their expected life is 22 years, but the tiny number of countries involved greatly diminishes confidence in this number.
36. See Banks, Cross-National Time-Series Data Archive. Among the 35 transitions that occurred after 1973, parliamentary institutions were chosen in 13 cases at the average level of $3,414, presidential institutions in 19 cases at the average level of $2,591, making the effect even more pronounced.
37. This is not to argue that countries that have adopted presidential institutions during recent transitions to democracy should immediately attempt to move to parliamentarism. Whenever institutional choice is present on the political agenda, substantive conflicts, even minor ones, tend to spill over to institutional issues. Such situations are dangerous for democracy, since they signify that there are no clear rules by which substantive conflicts can be terminated. Hence having a clear and stable institutional system is more important than having a perfect one. We owe this observation to Hyug Baeg Im.
38. The 1853 Constitution sets the period between the election and the inauguration at nine months because that is how long it took electors to travel from the interior to Buenos Aires. The transfer of office from President Raúl Alfonsín to the President-elect Carlos Menem was shortened as a result of a mutual agreement under the pressure of an inflationary crisis.
39. Robert A. Dahl, "Transitions to Democracy" (address delivered to the symposium on "Voices of Democracy," University of Dayton, Center for International Studies, 16-17 March 1990).
40. Guillermo O'Donnell, "Partial Institutionalization: Latin American and Elsewhere" (paper presented at the conference on "Consolidating Third Wave Democracies: Trends and Challenges," Taipei, Taiwan, 27-30 August 1995), implies that "institutionalization" can be understood in two ways: either as a process of gradual stabilization of expectations that a particular institutional system will orient political actions or as an increasing fit between formal institutions and real practices. If "institutionalization" is taken in the first sense, it is tautologically related to "consolidation." But whether democracy can survive when the formal institutions do not describe real practices is an empirical question.