IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cid/wpfacu/114.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Political Reform

Author

Listed:
  • Robert H. Bates

Abstract

In the last decade of the 20th Century, Africa joined the Third Wave of Democratization. Military regimes gave way to civilian governments, and no- and single-party systems to competitive political systems. The paper describes this transition; presents and evaluates two of the major explanations of it; and examines its impact on the policy choices of Africa’s governments. While reform made governments more accountable, it concludes, it may well have created incentives for them to adopt policies that destabilize the macro-economy.

Suggested Citation

  • Robert H. Bates, 2005. "Political Reform," CID Working Papers 114, Center for International Development at Harvard University.
    • Handle: RePEc:cid:wpfacu:114
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/publications/faculty-working-papers/114.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Steven A. Block & Karen E. Ferree & Smita Singh, 2003. "Multiparty Competition, Founding Elections and Political Business Cycles in Africa," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies, vol. 12(3), pages 444-468, September.
    2. Lindbeck, Assar, 1976. "Stabilization Policy in Open Economies with Endogenous Politicians," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 66(2), pages 1-19, May.
    3. Block, Steven A., 2001. "Does Africa grow differently?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(2), pages 443-467, August.
    4. John Ferejohn, 1986. "Incumbent performance and electoral control," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 50(1), pages 5-25, January.
    5. Humphreys, Macartan & Bates, Robert, 2005. "Political Institutions and Economic Policies: Lessons from Africa," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 35(3), pages 403-428, July.
    6. Rogoff, Kenneth, 1990. "Equilibrium Political Budget Cycles," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(1), pages 21-36, March.
    7. King, Gary & Zeng, Langche, 2001. "Explaining Rare Events in International Relations," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 55(3), pages 693-715, July.
    8. Przeworski,Adam & Alvarez,Michael E. & Cheibub,Jose Antonio & Limongi,Fernando, 2000. "Democracy and Development," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521793797, January.
    9. Block, Steven A., 2002. "Political business cycles, democratization, and economic reform: the case of Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 205-228, February.
    10. William D. Nordhaus, 1975. "The Political Business Cycle," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 42(2), pages 169-190.
    11. Przeworski,Adam & Alvarez,Michael E. & Cheibub,Jose Antonio & Limongi,Fernando, 2000. "Democracy and Development," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521790321, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Vaaler, Paul M., 2006. "Electoral Politics and Foreign Project Investment in Developing Countries," Working Papers 06-0125, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, College of Business.
    2. Eric Dubois, 2016. "Political Business Cycles 40 Years after Nordhaus," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) hal-01291401, HAL.
    3. Foremny, Dirk & Riedel, Nadine, 2014. "Business taxes and the electoral cycle," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 48-61.
    4. Eric Dubois, 2016. "Political business cycles 40 years after Nordhaus," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 166(1), pages 235-259, January.
    5. Eric Dubois, 2016. "Political Business Cycles 40 Years after Nordhaus," Post-Print hal-01291401, HAL.
    6. Vergne, Clémence, 2009. "Democracy, elections and allocation of public expenditures in developing countries," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 63-77, March.
    7. Kouvavas, Omiros, 2013. "Political Budget Cycles Revisited, the Case for Social Capital," MPRA Paper 57504, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 15 Sep 2013.
    8. Helene Ehrhart, 2013. "Elections and the structure of taxation in developing countries," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 156(1), pages 195-211, July.
    9. César Martinelli & John Duggan, 2014. "The Political Economy of Dynamic Elections: A Survey and Some New Results," Working Papers 1403, Centro de Investigacion Economica, ITAM.
    10. Marco Bonomo & Cristina Terra, 2005. "Elections And Exchange Rate Policy Cycles," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 17(2), pages 151-176, July.
    11. Ganesh Manjhi & Meeta Keswani Mehra, 2019. "Dynamics of Political Budget Cycle," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 5(1), pages 135-158, March.
    12. De Haan, Jakob & Ohnsorge, Franziska & Yu, Shu, 2023. "Election-induced fiscal policy cycles in emerging market and developing economies," CEPR Discussion Papers 18708, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    13. García, Israel & Hayo, Bernd, 2021. "Political budget cycles revisited: Testing the signalling process," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    14. Persson, Torsten & Tabellini, Guido, 1999. "Political economics and macroeconomic policy," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & M. Woodford (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 22, pages 1397-1482, Elsevier.
    15. Sainan Huang & Cristina Terra, 2016. "Exchange Rate Populism," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(1), pages 105-132, March.
    16. Marcos Yamada Nakaguma & Siegfried Bender, 2004. "A Emenda Da Reeleição E A Lei De Responsabilidade Fiscal: Impactos Sobre Ciclos Políticos E Performance Fiscal Dos Estados (1986-2002)," Anais do XXXII Encontro Nacional de Economia [Proceedings of the 32nd Brazilian Economics Meeting] 025, ANPEC - Associação Nacional dos Centros de Pós-Graduação em Economia [Brazilian Association of Graduate Programs in Economics].
    17. Georgios Efthyvoulou, 2012. "Political budget cycles in the European Union and the impact of political pressures," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 153(3), pages 295-327, December.
    18. Antoine Cazals & Pierre Mandon, 2015. "Political Budget Cycles: Manipulation of Leaders or Bias from Research? A Meta-Regression Analysis," Working Papers halshs-01238883, HAL.
    19. Khemani, Stuti, 2004. "Political cycles in a developing economy: effect of elections in the Indian States," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(1), pages 125-154, February.
    20. Persson, T., 1992. "Politics and Economic Policy," Papers 518, Stockholm - International Economic Studies.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    development; Africa; political economy; institutions; democratization; macro-economic policy;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E30 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
    • E62 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Fiscal Policy; Modern Monetary Theory
    • E63 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Comparative or Joint Analysis of Fiscal and Monetary Policy; Stabilization; Treasury Policy
    • O19 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - International Linkages to Development; Role of International Organizations
    • P48 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Other Economic Systems - - - Legal Institutions; Property Rights; Natural Resources; Energy; Environment; Regional Studies
    • P51 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Comparative Economic Systems - - - Comparative Analysis of Economic Systems

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:cid:wpfacu:114. 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: Chuck McKenney (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ciharus.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.