On the Relation of Economic Development to Democratic Performance

The relationship between economic growth and democratic political development has been the subject of considerable study. While most analysts have argued that the latter is a positive function of the former, there has been disagreement over both the form of the relationship and the definition of democratic political development itself. The purpose of this paper is to specify and estimate some simple models describing the relationship for a cross-section of 60 non-Communist countries. While the thesis that economic development fosters the emergence of democratic political institutions and processes has a long history in political thought, the first major attempt to assess it empirically was presented by Lipset in his well-known essay Some Social Requisites of Democracy: Economic Development and Political Legitimacy.' Using a number of indices of economic development, Lipset concluded that: