IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/red/sed010/216.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Democracy and Reforms

Author

Listed:
  • Prachi Mishra

    (IMF)

  • Antonio Spilimbergo

    (IMF)

  • Paola Giuliano

    (UCLA)

Abstract

Empirical evidence on the relationship between democracy and economic reforms is scarce, limited to few reforms and countries and for few years. This paper studies the impact of democracy on the adoption of economic reforms using a new dataset on reforms in the financial, capital, public, and banking sectors, product and labor markets, agriculture, and trade for 150 countries over the period 1960-2004. Democracy has a positive and significant impact on the adoption of economic reforms but there is no evidence that economic reforms foster democracy. Our results are robust to the inclusion of a large variety of controls and estimation strategies.

Suggested Citation

  • Prachi Mishra & Antonio Spilimbergo & Paola Giuliano, 2010. "Democracy and Reforms," 2010 Meeting Papers 216, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    • Handle: RePEc:red:sed010:216
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://red-files-public.s3.amazonaws.com/meetpapers/2010/paper_216.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Martin C. McGuire & Mancur Olson, 1998. "The Economics of Autocracy and Majority Rule: The Invisible Hand and the Use of Force," International Economic Association Series, in: Silvio Borner & Martin Paldam (ed.), The Political Dimension of Economic Growth, chapter 3, pages 38-73, Palgrave Macmillan.
    2. Timothy Besley & Torsten Persson, 2009. "The Origins of State Capacity: Property Rights, Taxation, and Politics," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(4), pages 1218-1244, September.
    3. Barry Eichengreen & David Leblang, 2008. "Democracy And Globalization," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 20(3), pages 289-334, November.
    4. Giavazzi, Francesco & Tabellini, Guido, 2005. "Economic and political liberalizations," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(7), pages 1297-1330, October.
    5. repec:lic:licosd:25109 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Romain Wacziarg & Karen Horn Welch, 2008. "Trade Liberalization and Growth: New Evidence," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 22(2), pages 187-231, June.
    7. Dani Rodrik, 1999. "Democracies Pay Higher Wages," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(3), pages 707-738.
    8. Fidrmuc, Jan, 2003. "Economic reform, democracy and growth during post-communist transition," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 19(3), pages 583-604, September.
    9. Alberto Alesina & Nouriel Roubini, 1992. "Political Cycles in OECD Economies," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 59(4), pages 663-688.
    10. Adam Przeworski & Fernando Limongi, 1993. "Political Regimes and Economic Growth," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 7(3), pages 51-69, Summer.
    11. 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.
    12. Torsten Persson & Guido Tabellini, 2009. "Democratic Capital: The Nexus of Political and Economic Change," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 1(2), pages 88-126, July.
    13. Allan Drazen & William Easterly, 2001. "Do Crises Induce Reform? Simple Empirical Tests of Conventional Wisdom," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(2), pages 129-157, July.
    14. 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.
    15. Michael A. Clemens & Jeffrey G. Williamson, 2004. "Why did the Tariff--Growth Correlation Change after 1950?," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 9(1), pages 5-46, March.
    16. Torsten Persson & Guido Tabellini, 2002. "Political Economics: Explaining Economic Policy," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262661314, April.
    17. Lora, Eduardo, 1998. "What Makes Reforms Likely? Timing and Sequencing of Structural Reforms in Latin America," Working Papers 244240, Inter-American Development Bank.
    18. Abdul Abiad & Enrica Detragiache & Thierry Tressel, 2010. "A New Database of Financial Reforms," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 57(2), pages 281-302, June.
    19. Casey B. Mulligan & Ricard Gil & Xavier Sala-i-Martin, 2004. "Do Democracies Have Different Public Policies than Nondemocracies?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 18(1), pages 51-74, Winter.
    20. Andrea Bassanini & Romain Duval, 2006. "Employment Patterns in OECD Countries: Reassessing the Role of Policies and Institutions," OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers 35, OECD Publishing.
    21. Abdul Abiad & Ashoka Mody, 2005. "Financial Reform: What Shakes It? What Shapes It?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(1), pages 66-88, March.
    22. Acemoglu,Daron & Robinson,James A., 2009. "Economic Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521671422.
    23. Xavier Sala-i-Martin, 2006. "The World Distribution of Income: Falling Poverty and … Convergence, Period," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 121(2), pages 351-397.
    24. Rajan, Raghuram G. & Zingales, Luigi, 2003. "The great reversals: the politics of financial development in the twentieth century," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(1), pages 5-50, July.
    25. Seiford, Lawrence M. & Thrall, Robert M., 1990. "Recent developments in DEA : The mathematical programming approach to frontier analysis," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 46(1-2), pages 7-38.
    26. Quinn, Dennis, 1997. "The Correlates of Change in International Financial Regulation," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 91(3), pages 531-551, September.
    27. Fernandez, Raquel & Rodrik, Dani, 1991. "Resistance to Reform: Status Quo Bias in the Presence of Individual-Specific Uncertainty," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(5), pages 1146-1155, December.
    28. Dethier, Jean-Jacques & Ghanem, Hafez & Zoli, Edda, 1999. "Does democracy facilitate the economic transition : an empirical study of Central and Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2194, The World Bank.
    29. Banerji, Arup & Ghanem, Hafez, 1997. "Does the Type of Political Regime Matter for Trade and Labor Market Policies?," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 11(1), pages 171-194, January.
    30. Abdul Abiad & Ashoka Mody, 2005. "Financial Reform: What Shakes It? What Shapes It?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(1), pages 66-88, March.
    31. Milner, Helen V. & Kubota, Keiko, 2005. "Why the Move to Free Trade? Democracy and Trade Policy in the Developing Countries," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 59(1), pages 107-143, January.
    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. repec:lic:licosd:32312 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Lipscy, Phillip Y., 2018. "Democracy and Financial Crisis," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 72(4), pages 937-968, October.
    3. Mr. Abdul d Abiad & Ms. Petya Koeva Brooks & Ms. Irina Tytell & Mr. Daniel Leigh & Mr. Ravi Balakrishnan, 2009. "What’s the Damage? Medium-term Output Dynamics After Banking Crises," IMF Working Papers 2009/245, International Monetary Fund.
    4. Hauner, David & Prati, Alessandro & Bircan, Cagatay, 2013. "The interest group theory of financial development: Evidence from regulation," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 895-906.
    5. Kym Anderson & Gordon Rausser & Johan Swinnen, 2013. "Political Economy of Public Policies: Insights from Distortions to Agricultural and Food Markets," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 51(2), pages 423-477, June.
    6. Jan Fałkowski & Alessandro Olper, 2014. "Political competition and policy choices: the evidence from agricultural protection," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 45(2), pages 143-158, March.
    7. repec:lic:licosd:30512 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Alali, Walid Y., 2010. "Role of Political Institutions on Economic Growth: Empirical Evidence," EconStor Preprints 269879, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    9. Kammas, Pantelis & Sarantides, Vassilis, 2019. "Do dictatorships redistribute more?," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 176-195.
    10. Mr. Rabah Arezki & Mr. Marc G Quintyn & Mr. Frederik G Toscani, 2012. "Structural Reforms, IMF Programs and Capacity Building: An Empirical Investigation," IMF Working Papers 2012/232, International Monetary Fund.
    11. Alali, Walid Y., 2010. "Role of Political Institutions on Economic Growth: Empirical Evidence," MPRA Paper 115611, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Cagatay Bircan & David Hauner & Alessandro Prati, 2012. "The interest group theory of financial development: evidence from regulation," Working Papers 150, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, Office of the Chief Economist.
    13. Olper, Alessandro & Raimondi, Valentina, 2013. "Electoral rules, forms of government and redistributive policy: Evidence from agriculture and food policies," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 141-158.

    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. Paola Giuliano & Prachi Mishra & Antonio Spilimbergo, 2013. "Democracy and Reforms: Evidence from a New Dataset," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(4), pages 179-204, October.
    2. Nauro F. Campos & Paul De Grauwe & Yuemei Ji, 2017. "Structural Reforms, Growth and Inequality: An Overview of Theory, Measurement and Evidence," CESifo Working Paper Series 6812, CESifo.
    3. Agnello, Luca & Castro, Vitor & Jalles, João Tovar & Sousa, Ricardo M., 2015. "What determines the likelihood of structural reforms?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 129-145.
    4. Nan Li & Chris Papageorgiou & Tao Zha, 2021. "The S-curve: Understanding the Dynamics of Worldwide Financial Liberalization," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2021-19, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
    5. Elias Papaioannou & Gregorios Siourounis, 2008. "Democratisation and Growth," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 118(532), pages 1520-1551, October.
    6. Christiansen, Lone & Schindler, Martin & Tressel, Thierry, 2013. "Growth and structural reforms: A new assessment," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(2), pages 347-356.
    7. María Clara Arroyo, 2018. "The Effect of Executive Constraints on Reform Implementation: An Empirical Analysis," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 0118, Department of Economics - dECON.
    8. Alali, Walid Y., 2010. "Role of Political Institutions on Economic Growth: Empirical Evidence," EconStor Preprints 269879, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    9. Alali, Walid Y., 2010. "Role of Political Institutions on Economic Growth: Empirical Evidence," MPRA Paper 115611, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Bonfiglioli, Alessandra & Gancia, Gino, 2015. "Economic Uncertainty and Structural Reforms," CEPR Discussion Papers 10937, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    11. Barry Eichengreen & David Leblang, 2008. "Democracy And Globalization," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 20(3), pages 289-334, November.
    12. Hauner, David & Prati, Alessandro & Bircan, Cagatay, 2013. "The interest group theory of financial development: Evidence from regulation," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 895-906.
    13. Thomas Apolte, 2011. "Democracy and prosperity in two decades of transition," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 19(4), pages 693-722, October.
    14. Olper, Alessandro & Falkowski, Jan & Swinnen, Johan F.M., 2009. "Democracy and Agricultural Protection: Parametric and Semi-parametric Matching Estimates," 2009 Annual Meeting, July 26-28, 2009, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 49313, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    15. Bhattacharyya, Sambit, 2012. "Trade liberalization and institutional development," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 253-269.
    16. repec:lic:licosd:25109 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Torsten Persson & Guido Tabellini, 2009. "Democratic Capital: The Nexus of Political and Economic Change," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 1(2), pages 88-126, July.
    18. Alessandro Olper & Jan Fałkowski & Johan Swinnen, 2014. "Political Reforms and Public Policy: Evidence from Agricultural and Food Policies," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 28(1), pages 21-47.
    19. Kym Anderson & Gordon Rausser & Johan Swinnen, 2013. "Political Economy of Public Policies: Insights from Distortions to Agricultural and Food Markets," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 51(2), pages 423-477, June.
    20. Vincenzo Galasso, 2014. "The role of political partisanship during economic crises," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 158(1), pages 143-165, January.
    21. Davide Romelli, 2022. "The political economy of reforms in Central Bank design: evidence from a new dataset," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 37(112), pages 641-688.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • O57 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Comparative Studies of Countries
    • E6 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook

    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:red:sed010:216. 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: Christian Zimmermann (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sedddea.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.