IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecosys/v34y2010i1p91-104.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Capitalism and freedom?

Author

Listed:
  • Pryor, Frederic L.

Abstract

This essay tests Milton Friedman's conjecture that capitalism is a necessary condition for political freedom. For the decade around 2000 indices of the degree of capitalism and the degree of political freedom are highly correlated and provide plausibility for Friedman's conjecture. In looking at changes over time in the nineteenth century, however, the analysis refutes Friedman's conjecture. These apparently contradictory results are reconciled by showing that both capitalism and freedom are related to such variables as the educational level of the population so that, although not causally tied, they are correlated in a cross-national comparison.

Suggested Citation

  • Pryor, Frederic L., 2010. "Capitalism and freedom?," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 91-104, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecosys:v:34:y:2010:i:1:p:91-104
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0939-3625(09)00055-7
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Daron Acemoglu & Simon Johnson & James A. Robinson & Pierre Yared, 2008. "Income and Democracy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(3), pages 808-842, June.
    2. Pryor,Frederic L., 2005. "Economic Systems of Foraging, Agricultural, and Industrial Societies," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521613477, September.
    3. Kaufmann, Daniel & Kraay, Aart & Mastruzzi, Massimo, 2007. "Governance Matters VI: Aggregate and Individual Governance Indicators, 1996-2006," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4280, The World Bank.
    4. Barro, Robert J & Lee, Jong-Wha, 2001. "International Data on Educational Attainment: Updates and Implications," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 53(3), pages 541-563, July.
    5. World Bank, 2008. "World Development Indicators 2008," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 11855.
    6. Timothy Besley & Masayuki Kudamatsu, 2007. "Making Autocracy Work," STICERD - Development Economics Papers - From 2008 this series has been superseded by Economic Organisation and Public Policy Discussion Papers 48, Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines, LSE.
    7. Pryor,Frederic L., 2005. "Economic Systems of Foraging, Agricultural, and Industrial Societies," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521849043, September.
    8. Pryor, Frederic L, 1972. "An International Comparison of Concentration Ratios," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 54(2), pages 130-140, May.
    9. World Bank, 2008. "World Development Indicators 2008," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 28241.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Marta Marson & Matteo Migheli & Donatella Saccone, 2021. "New evidence on the link between ethnic fractionalization and economic freedom," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 22(3), pages 257-292, September.
    2. Bjørnskov, Christian, 2018. "The Hayek–Friedman hypothesis on the press: is there an association between economic freedom and press freedom?," Journal of Institutional Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(4), pages 617-638, August.
    3. Ryan H Murphy, 2024. "Not following the script: When institutional development is uneven," Economic Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(2), pages 338-352, June.
    4. Aurolipsa Das & Narayan Sethi, 2023. "Modelling the environmental pollution-institutional quality nexus in low- and middle-income countries: exploring the role of financial development and educational level," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 25(2), pages 1492-1518, February.
    5. Tausch, Arno, 2015. "Hofstede, Inglehart and beyond. New directions in empirical global value research," MPRA Paper 64282, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 11 May 2015.
    6. Kapás, Judit & Czeglédi, Pál, 2011. "Gazdasági szabadság, politikai szabadság és a társadalmi rendek [Economic freedom, political freedom, and social orders]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(6), pages 485-510.
    7. Ryan H. Murphy, 2019. "Governance and the dimensions of autocracy," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 30(2), pages 131-148, June.
    8. Judit Kapás & Pál Czeglédi, 2018. "Social orders, and a weak form of the Hayek–Friedman Hypothesis," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 65(3), pages 291-328, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Klaus Desmet & Ignacio Ortuño-Ortín & Romain Wacziarg, 2009. "The political economy of ethnolinguistic cleavages," Working Papers 2009-17, Instituto Madrileño de Estudios Avanzados (IMDEA) Ciencias Sociales.
    2. Vrachimis Konstantinos & Zachariadis Marios, 2013. "A contribution to the empirics of welfare growth," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 13(1), pages 213-244, April.
    3. Bergh, Andreas & Nilsson, Therese, 2010. "Good for Living? On the Relationship between Globalization and Life Expectancy," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(9), pages 1191-1203, September.
    4. John M. Piotrowski & Mr. Rabah Arezki & Reda Cherif, 2009. "Tourism Specialization and Economic Development: Evidence from the UNESCO World Heritage List," IMF Working Papers 2009/176, International Monetary Fund.
    5. Harms, Philipp & an de Meulen, Philipp, 2013. "Demographic structure and the security of property rights: The role of development and democracy," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 73-89.
    6. Mario Coccia, 2017. "The relation between typologies of executive and technological performances of nations," IRCrES Working Paper 201701, CNR-IRCrES Research Institute on Sustainable Economic Growth - Moncalieri (TO) ITALY - former Institute for Economic Research on Firms and Growth - Torino (TO) ITALY.
    7. Desmet, Klaus & Ortuño-Ortín, Ignacio & Wacziarg, Romain, 2012. "The political economy of linguistic cleavages," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(2), pages 322-338.
    8. Boubakri, Narjess & Guedhami, Omrane & Mishra, Dev & Saffar, Walid, 2012. "Political connections and the cost of equity capital," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 541-559.
    9. Gilles Dufrenot & Valerie Mignon & Charalambos Tsangarides, 2010. "The trade-growth nexus in the developing countries: a quantile regression approach," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 146(4), pages 731-761, December.
    10. Markus Eberhardt & Francis Teal, 2010. "Aggregation versus Heterogeneity in Cross-Country Growth Empirics," CSAE Working Paper Series 2010-32, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    11. Presbitero, Andrea F., 2008. "Debt Relief Effectiveness and Institution Building," MPRA Paper 12597, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Christopher Gelpi & Nazli Avdan, 2018. "Democracies at risk? A forecasting analysis of regime type and the risk of terrorist attack," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 35(1), pages 18-42, January.
    13. Bergh, Andreas & Nilsson, Therese, 2010. "Do liberalization and globalization increase income inequality?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 488-505, December.
    14. Williams, Andrew, 2011. "Shining a Light on the Resource Curse: An Empirical Analysis of the Relationship Between Natural Resources, Transparency, and Economic Growth," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(4), pages 490-505, April.
    15. Aamer S. Abu-Qarn & Suleiman Abu-Bader, 2009. "Getting Income Shares Right," Economic Development Quarterly, , vol. 23(3), pages 254-266, August.
    16. Fleck, Robert K. & Kilby, Christopher, 2010. "Changing aid regimes? U.S. foreign aid from the Cold War to the War on Terror," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(2), pages 185-197, March.
    17. Christoph Sax, 2011. "Constraint or choice? Disentangling fertility determinants by switching regressions," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 25(23), pages 723-754.
    18. Raschky, Paul A. & Schwindt, Manijeh, 2012. "On the channel and type of aid: The case of international disaster assistance," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 119-131.
    19. Stefanie Kleimeier & Roald Versteeg, 2010. "Project finance as a driver of economic growth in low‐income countries," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 19(2), pages 49-59, April.
    20. Simona Benedettini, 2009. "On Convergence across Transition Economies’ Financial Markets: the Role of Creditor Rights," Department of Economics University of Siena 580, Department of Economics, University of Siena.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ecosys:v:34:y:2010:i:1:p:91-104. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/osteide.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.