One Road to Riches? (Elements in Political Economy) - Softcover

Gjerløw, Haakon

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1009054554 ISBN 13: 9781009054553

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2022

Synopsis

Building effective state institutions before introducing democracy is widely presumed to improve different development outcomes. Conversely, proponents of this “stateness-first” argument anticipate that democratization before state building yields poor development outcomes. In this Element, we discuss several strong assumptions that (different versions of) this argument rests upon and critically evaluate the existing evidence base. In extension, we specify various observable implications. We then subject the stateness-first argument to multiple tests, focusing on economic growth as an outcome. First, we conduct historical case studies of two countries with different institutional sequencing histories, Denmark and Greece, and assess the stateness-first argument (e.g., by using a synthetic control approach). Thereafter, we draw on an extensive global sample of about 180 countries, measured across 1789–2019 and leverage panel regressions, preparametric matching, and sequence analysis to test a number of observable implications. Overall, we find little evidence to support the stateness-first argument.

Edition details

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 2022
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1009054554
• ISBN 13: 9781009054553
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 96