World of Difference
Katerina Linos
American Journal of Political Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Many argue that international norms influence government behavior, and that policies diffuse from country to country, because of idea exchanges within elite networks. However, politicians are not free to follow their foreign counterparts, because domestic constituencies constrain them. This article examines how electoral concerns shape diffusion patterns and argues that foreign templates and international organization recommendations can shift voters' policy positions and produce electoral incentives for politicians to mimic certain foreign models. Experimental individual-level data from the field of family policy illustrates that even U.S. voters shift positions substantially when informed about UN recommendations and foreign countries' choices. However, voters receive limited information about international developments, biased towards the policy choices of large and proximate countries. Aggregate data on the family policy choices of OECD countries show how voters' limited information about international models shapes government decisions: governments are disproportionately likely to mimic countries whose news citizens follow, and international organizations are most influential in countries with internationally oriented citizens.
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Unexpected Bedfellows: The GATT, the WTO and Some Democratic Rights
Susan Ariel Aaronson & Rodwan Abouharb
International Studies Quarterly, forthcoming
Abstract:
The WTO system and democratic rights are unexpected bedfellows. The GATT/WTO requires governments to adopt policies that provide foreign products (read producers) with due process, political participation, and information rights related to trade policymaking. Because these nations also provide these rights to their citizens, a growing number of people are learning how to influence trade-related policies. As trade today encompasses many areas of governance, these same citizens may gradually transfer the skills learned from influencing trade policies to other public issues. Thus, the WTO not only empowers foreign market actors, but also citizens in repressive states. We use both qualitative and quantitative analysis to examine whether membership in the WTO over time leads to improvements in these democratic rights. Our qualitative analysis shows that these issues are discussed during accessions and trade policy reviews. Quantitative analysis examines how members of the GATT/WTO perform on these democratic rights over time. We use a cross-national time series design of all countries, accounting for selection issues of why countries become members of the GATT/WTO regime. We find that longer GATT/WTO membership leads to stronger performance on our metrics for political participation, free and fair elections, and access to information.
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When Fast Growing Economies Slow Down: International Evidence and Implications for China
Barry Eichengreen, Donghyun Park & Kwanho Shin
NBER Working Paper, March 2011
Abstract:
Using international data starting in 1957, we construct a sample of cases where fast-growing economies slow down. The evidence suggests that rapidly growing economies slow down significantly, in the sense that the growth rate downshifts by at least 2 percentage points, when their per capita incomes reach around $17,000 US in year-2005 constant international prices, a level that China should achieve by or soon after 2015. Among our more provocative findings is that growth slowdowns are more likely in countries that maintain undervalued real exchange rates.
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Globalization and Global Inequality: Assessing the Impact of the Rise of China and India, 1980-2005
Ho-fung Hung & Jaime Kucinskas
American Journal of Sociology, March 2011, Pages 1478-1513
Abstract:
This article uses updated purchasing power parity measurements of countries' income and a new strategy for approximating global inequality to examine how global income inequality - as a combination of increasing average within-country inequality and decreasing between-country inequality - changed in the period 1980-2005. In view of the overwhelming influence of China and India on trends in global inequality change, the authors base their strategy on estimating the change in world average within-country inequality from change in within-country inequality of these two countries. The authors find that global inequality decreased continuously throughout the period. They also project that global inequality will likely rise again in the next 25 years unless the stellar economic performance of China and India spreads widely to other developing countries.
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Public support for liberal democracy
Peter Kotzian
International Political Science Review, January 2011, Pages 23-41
Abstract:
This article analyzes the importance of system-level features, such as political and economic development, and individual-level factors for the support of liberal democracy. Using multilevel modeling, the study explicitly distinguishes between the role of subjective evaluations at the individual level and objective facts at the system level. The findings obtained using a sample of 36 countries indicate that objective economic performance is the most important system-level factor for system support. Improvements in the degree of democracy do not affect public support. Individual subjective perception is predominant for determining specific support. Contrary to previous studies, there is no evidence that the liberal-democratic society reaches a degree of acceptance that immunizes it from economic developments. Nor is there evidence that citizens of non-democratic regime types will urge for democratic change when the regime performs well in economic terms.
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Happiness on Tap: Piped Water Adoption in Urban Morocco
Florencia Devoto et al.
NBER Working Paper, April 2011
Abstract:
We study the demand for household water connections in urban Morocco, and the effect of such connections on household welfare. In the northern city of Tangiers, among homeowners without a private connection to the city's water grid, a random subset was offered a simplified procedure to purchase a household connection on credit (at a zero percent interest rate). Take-up was high, at 69%. Because all households in our sample had access to the water grid through free public taps (often located fairly close to their homes), household connections did not lead to any improvement in the quality of the water households consumed; and despite significant increase in the quantity of water consumed, we find no change in the incidence of waterborne illnesses. Nevertheless, we find that households are willing to pay a substantial amount of money to have a private tap at home. Being connected generates important time gains, which are used for leisure and social activities, rather than productive activities. Because water is often a source of tension between households, household connections improve social integration and reduce conflict. Overall, within 6 months, self-reported well-being improved substantially among households in the treatment group, despite the financial cost of the connection. Our results suggest that facilitating access to credit for households to finance lump sum quality-of-life investments can significantly increase welfare, even if those investments do not result in income or health gains.
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Did Ivan's vote matter? The political economy of local democracy in Tsarist Russia
Steven Nafziger
European Review of Economic History, forthcoming
Abstract:
Russia's emancipation of the serfs was accompanied by numerous other measures aimed at modernizing the Tsarist economy and society. Among these 'Great Reforms' was the creation of a new institution of local government - the zemstvo - which has received comparatively little attention from economic historians. This quasi-democratic form of local government played an important role in expanding the provision of public goods and services in the half-century leading up to the Russian Revolution. This article utilizes archival records and contemporary evidence to outline the zemstvo's role in Russian society and describe its political structure. The article then presents a newly collected panel data set that includes information on the allocation of political rights within the zemstvo, spending and revenue decisions by district zemstva, and a variety of other socio-economic indicators. With these data, I explore whether the electoral structure of the zemstvo allowed the newly emancipated peasantry to voice their preferences over spending levels and tax rates. I find that the district zemstvo with greater political representation from the peasantry shifted taxes away from communal property and spent more per capita, especially on education. However, these effects did not derive from a direct voting mechanism but most likely arose out of the interaction between peasant representation and more liberal elements of the noble class. This study initiates a broader research agenda into the zemstvo's place in Russian economic history and contributes to the literature on the political economy of public good provision in developing societies.
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Willa Friedman et al.
NBER Working Paper, April 2011
Abstract:
Less developed regions have experienced massive increases in both education and democracy over the past half century, and it is widely claimed that many recent democratic transitions have been propelled by increasingly educated youth populations. Scholars have also speculated about education's social and political impacts, variously arguing that education promotes "modern" pro-democratic and secular attitudes and weakens ethnic attachments; that it instills acceptance of existing authority; and that it empowers the disadvantaged. These views have informed international efforts to promote education in poor countries, often focusing on girls. We assess the social and political impacts of a randomized girls' merit scholarship incentive program in Kenya that raised test scores and secondary school enrollment. Counter to modernization theory, increased human capital did not produce more pro-democratic or secular attitudes and, if anything, it strengthened ethnic identification. Consistent with the empowerment view, young women in program schools had fewer arranged marriages and were less likely to accept domestic violence as legitimate. Moreover, the program increased objective political knowledge, and reduced both acceptance of political authorities and satisfaction with politics. However, in our Kenyan context, this rejection of the status quo did not translate into greater perceived political efficacy, community participation or voting intentions. Instead, the program increased the perceived legitimacy of political violence. We argue that selection bias may account for the view that education instills greater acceptance of authority.
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Catch Us If You Can: Election Monitoring and International Norm Diffusion
Susan Hyde
American Journal of Political Science, April 2011, Pages 356-369
Abstract:
Why has the decision to invite foreign election observers become an international norm? More generally, how do international norms develop in the absence of incentives for cooperation or activism by norm entrepreneurs? Motivated by the case of election observation, I argue that international norms can be generated through a diffusely motivated signaling process. Responding to increased benefits associated with being democratic, international election observation was initiated by democratizing governments as a signal of a government's commitment to democracy. Increased democracy-contingent benefits gave other "true-democrats" the incentive to invite observers, resulting in a widespread belief that all true-democrats invite election monitors. Consequently, not inviting observers became an unambiguous signal that a government was not democratizing, giving even pseudo-democrats reason to invite observers and risk a negative report. I evaluate this theory with an original global dataset on elections and election observation, 1960-2006.
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The American role in education in the Middle East: Ideology and experiment, 1920-1940
David Ment
Paedagogica Historica, Winter 2011, Pages 173-189
Abstract:
In a significant 1925 essay, "Western Education in Moslem Lands", Paul Monroe addressed the emerging cultural and political forces faced by American educators in the Middle East. Monroe was widely recognised at the time as editor of the Cyclopedia of Education and director of the International Institute of Teachers College, Columbia University. During the period between the wars, he made the Middle East a major focus of practical activity as adviser to the Near East Relief and surveyor of educational conditions (1930), director of an advisory commission to King Faisal of Iraq (1932), and president of Robert College in Istanbul (1933-1935). This article analyses the themes presented in Monroe's essay and explores how those ideas evolved when implemented in educational projects in the region. Pointing to an older missionary relationship between Western education and the semi-colonial relatively powerless Middle East, Monroe argued that conditions were changing and proposed a redefinition of the American educator's role. In his work in Iraq and Turkey and the Near East, Monroe developed a conception that American education could provide a resource to the Middle East which the nations themselves could evaluate and draw upon as needed, and he learned the difficulties in putting such ideas into practice.
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Conditioning the "Resource Curse": Globalization, Human Capital, and Growth in Oil-Rich Nations
Marcus Kurtz & Sarah Brooks
Comparative Political Studies, forthcoming
Abstract:
Since the 1990s it has become conventional wisdom that an abundance of natural resources, most notably oil, is very likely to become a developmental "curse." Recent scholarship, however, has begun to call into question this apparent consensus, drawing attention to the situations in which quite the opposite result appears to hold, namely, where resources become a developmental "blessing." Research in this vein focuses predominantly on the domestic political and economic institutions that condition the growth effects of natural resource wealth. Less attention, however, has been paid to whether or how the context of economic integration has conditioned the domestic political economy of natural resource development. This article specifically addresses this theoretical disjuncture by arguing first that the developmental consequences of oil wealth are strongly conditioned by domestic human capital resources, which, where sizeable, make possible the management of resources in ways that encourage the absorption of technology and development of valuable new economic sectors. In the absence of robust human capital formation, however, the archetypal "resource curse" is likely to result. The authors argue moreover that international economic integration further amplifies the divergence between these outcomes by simultaneously raising the growth-enhancing effects of large stocks of human capital and by directly facilitating economic growth. Analysis of global data on growth and oil abundance (1979-2007) supports their main hypotheses that natural resource wealth can be either a "curse" or a "blessing" and that the distinction is conditioned by domestic and international factors, both amenable to change through public policy, namely, human capital formation and economic openness.
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Sponsoring Democracy: The United States and Democracy Aid to the Developing World, 1988-2001
James Scott & Carie Steele
International Studies Quarterly, March 2011, Pages 47-69
Abstract:
As democratization has advanced in the developing world, developed countries such as the United States have implemented explicit strategies of democracy promotion by providing assistance to governments, political parties, and other non-governmental groups and organizations through a variety of channels. This analysis examines the relationship between democracy support by the US Agency for International Development and democratization in the developing world between 1988 and 2001. In a model that examines the simultaneous processes linking democratization and democracy aid, we argue that carefully targeted democracy assistance has greater impact on democratization than more generic economic aid packages. We test the relationship in a simultaneous equation model, supplemented by several time-series cross-sectional regressions. Our data reveal a positive relationship between specific democracy aid packages and progress toward democracy. We conclude by weighing the implications of these findings for democratization and democracy promotion policies.
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Was Vietnam's Economic Growth in the 1990s Pro-Poor? An Analysis of Panel Data from Vietnam
Paul Glewwe & Hai-Anh Hoang Dang
Economic Development and Cultural Change, April 2011, Pages 583-608
Abstract:
International aid agencies and almost all economists agree that economic growth is necessary for reducing poverty, yet some economists question whether it is sufficient for poverty reduction. Vietnam enjoyed rapid economic growth in the 1990s, but a modest increase in inequality during that decade raises the possibility that the poor in Vietnam benefited little from that growth. This article examines the extent to which Vietnam's economic growth has been "pro-poor," giving particular attention to two issues. The first is the appropriate comparison group. When comparing the poorest x% of the population at two points in time, should the poorest x% in the first time period be compared to the poorest x% in the second time period (some of whom were not the poorest x% in the first time period) or to the same people in the second time period (some of whom are no longer among the poorest x%)? The second is measurement error. Estimates of growth among the poorest x% of the population are likely to be biased if income or expenditure is measured with error. Household survey data show that Vietnam's growth has been relatively equally shared across poor and nonpoor groups. Indeed, comparisons of the same people over time indicate that per capita expenditures of the poor increased much more rapidly than those of the nonpoor, although failure to correct for measurement error exaggerates this result.
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Do International Election Monitors Increase or Decrease Opposition Boycotts?
Judith Kelley
Comparative Political Studies, forthcoming
Abstract:
Election boycotts are over twice as common when international observers are present. Do international observers increase election boycotts as this correlation and past research suggest? This article argues not. Observers tend to go to elections with many problems, and it is primarily these, rather than monitors, that drive boycotts. Furthermore, opposition parties have reasons to hope that observers can improve the quality of the election or that they will increase attention to election fraud, and therefore opposition parties may actually abandon boycott plans. Whether they do, however, depends on their expectations about how the observers will behave. This makes it important to account for the varying reputation of observer organizations. Thus, using matching to address the selection problem, this article shows that international observers can actually deter boycotts, but only if the observers are reputable.
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Media Freedom and Socio-Political Instability
Sudeshna Pal
Peace Economics, Peace Science and Public Policy, 2011
Abstract:
Free media may reduce incidents of socio-political instability. Different types of socio-political instability have been shown to have a negative effect on investment and economic growth. This study examines the effect of free media on various indicators of socio-political instability. Using a panel of 98 countries over 1994-2005, this study shows that media free from government control and interference may decrease different forms of socio-political instability because it puts internal and external pressure on self-interested governments to act in the best interests of citizens-rather than their own. The empirical results suggest that a freer media is associated with lower levels of socio-political instability as measured by ethnic tensions, external and internal conflicts, crime and disorder, military participation in government and religious tensions. The estimates are robust to several sensitivity tests.
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Has India's Economic Growth Become More Pro-Poor in the Wake of Economic Reforms?
Gaurav Datt & Martin Ravallion
World Bank Economic Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
The extent to which India's poor have benefited from the country's economic growth has long been debated. A new series of consumption-based poverty measures spanning 50 years, including a 15-year period after economic reforms began in earnest in the early 1990s, is used to examine that issue. Growth has tended to reduce poverty, including in the postreform period. There is no robust evidence of more or less poverty responsiveness to growth since the reforms began, although there are signs of rising inequality. The impact of growth is higher when using poverty measures that reflect distribution below the poverty line and when using growth rates calculated from household surveys rather than national accounts. The urban-rural pattern of growth matters for the pace of poverty reduction. However, in marked contrast to the period before the reforms, urban economic growth in the period after the reforms has brought significant gains to the rural poor as well as the urban poor.
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Does It Take Democrats to Democratize? Lessons From Islamic and Secular Elite Values in Turkey
Murat Somer
Comparative Political Studies, May 2011, Pages 511-545
Abstract:
Do political-Islamic elites need to be democrats for participation in democracy, how do their values compare to secular elites', and how do their values change through participation and affect democratization itself? A comparative-systematic content analysis of three Islamic-conservative and two pro-secular Turkish newspapers over nine years shows that, overall, political-Islamic elites adopt democratic political values. Furthermore, they began to view that liberal-democratic rights and freedoms serve their interests. However, value democratization, and, thus, moderation and democratization, is not a linear and inexorable process automatically resulting from participation or socioeconomic development. It occurs through ruptures such as conflicts with secular actors, and interdependently through the interactions of secular and religious actors. Hence, religious actors' adoption of more democracy may paradoxically make some secular actors less democratic. The consolidation of pluralistic democracy requires the emergence of both religious and secular democrats by resolving complex problems of commitment, and of clashes in areas like social pluralism where Islamic values are less open to change.
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Segregation and the Quality of Government
Alberto Alesina & Ekaterina Zhuravskayay
American Economic Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
This paper has three goals. The first, and perhaps the most important, is to provide a new compilation of data on ethnic, linguistic and religious composition at the sub-national level for a large number of countries. This data set allows us to measure segregation of different ethnic, religious and linguistic groups within the same country. The second goal is to correlate measures of segregation with measures of quality of the polity and policymaking. The third is to construct an instrument that helps to overcome the endogeneity problem which arises because groups move within country borders, partly in response to policies. We find that more ethnically and linguistically segregated countries, i.e., those where groups live more spatially separately, have a substantially lower quality of government. In contrast, we find no relationship between religious segregation and the quality of government.