The Minimum Wage and the Cause of Democracy

Too often the minimum wage is conceived of as a small policy measure that will be of benefit to only a small segment of the labor market while imposing costs on another segment of the labor market. Unexplored, however, are the larger philosophic questions that such a small measure may actually raise. One such issue is the relationship between the minimum wage and democratic principles. In this paper I argue that the minimum wage furthers the ends of democratic society in that low-wage workers may achieve greater equality of standing with their piers to the extent that income inequality is at all lessened; their autonomy as individuals is enhanced through higher wages, which in turn enables them to claim the benefits of citizenship and participate more effectively in the democratic process; and it fosters greater economic development in that it raises the overall structure of a region and perhaps the productivity of that region.     

Short and long run democracy diffusion

Does democracy diffuse across borders? If so, how long does it take? Can diffusion cause path dependence, such that if a region is initially democratic (or autocratic), it becomes increasingly so? In this paper I estimate short and long run regional democratic diffusion and account for feedback to and from other countries within the region. Although it is difficult to establish causality, I estimate that when regional democracy in year (t-1) increases, domestic democracy receives or “catches” 40–42% of the increase in the next 5 years, 55–61% in 10 years, and 68–85% in the long run prior to accounting for feedback. When I account for feedback, the average region converges to a unique long-run democracy level regardless of how democratic it is initially. I also provide region-specific and contiguous neighbor estimates, use the model to explain democratization waves, and estimate the alternative V-DEM dataset. In the V-DEM data, democracy diffuses much faster, although the long-run diffusion effects are comparable.     

论市场经济与民主制度建设的关系

市场经济与民主制度之间存在着某种内在的和必然的联系,市场经济的发展要有民主制度作基石,市场经济的有序运行有赖于民主制度的保障.市场经济与民主制度的形成与发展有正向关系,能够互相促进;又有负向关系,制约着对方的发展.必须促进二者协调发展,让市场经济为民主建设提供物质基础,同时,民主制度推动市场经济的良性发展.     

民主改革以来西藏的经济发展与前瞻

半个世纪前的民主改革使西藏社会经济实现了巨大的发展和进步,2008年的经济总量较50年前增长近66倍,为我国经济增长较快速省区。50年来,西藏产业结构及空间布局逐步优化,基础设施不断改善,人民生活水平持续提高,生态环境得到有效保护。但需认识到,西藏今天的经济成就,是在国家及兄弟省市全力支持下取得的,自我发展能力不足,发展区位和自然条件较差的问题依然突出。西藏未来的经济发展,需按照既定目标,继续坚持改革开放和"两个长期不变"基本方针,实施新型"跨越式"发展战略,加大城乡基础设施建设力度,引导优势、特色产业发展,提升城镇化水平,加快"一点、三线、四区"区域经济格局形成,走与西藏实际相符合的可持续发展之路。     

Inclusive institutions,unequal outcomes: Democracy,state capacity,and income inequality

Although the relationship between democratic rule and income inequality has received important attention in recent literature, the evidence has been far from conclusive. In this paper, we explore whether the redistributive effect of democratic rule is conditional on state capacity. Previous literature has outlined that pre-existing state capacity may be necessary for inequality-reducing policies under democratic rule. In contrast to that intuitive view, this study argues that democratic rule and high state capacity combined produce higher levels of income inequality over time. This relationship operates through the positive effect of high-capacity democratic context on foreign direct investment and financial development. By making use of a novel measure of state capacity based on cumulative census administration, we find empirical support for these claims using fixed-effects panel regressions with the data from 126 industrial and developing countries between 1970 and 2013.     

Toward Subnational Democracies of Scale: Tensions between Democratic Legitimacy,Legality, and Effective Governance

Although democracy is often discussed as a universally applicable ideology, the liberal democratic state tends to assess democracy on the basis of government institutions. This paper argues that democratic institutionalism favours national governments and makes it difficult for subnational governments to expand their governance capacity and exercise additional powers. Greenland, Shetland, and Tresco (Isles of Scilly) serve as case studies of different subnational strategies for exercising greater governance capacity: 1) Actual adherence to democratic form (Greenland), 2) Symbolic adherence to democratic form (Shetland), and 3) Operating external to democratic form (Tresco). Despite the efforts of local governance actors, governance in these three island communities has proved problematic in terms of democratic legitimacy, legality, and/or effectiveness. It is argued that pressure toward the development of liberal democratic government institutions can in fact decrease the quality of subnational democracy. This requires a reassessment of definitions of democracy and authoritarianism. It is necessary to pursue place-specific and community-sensitive democracies of scale if we wish to democratically empower local communities.     

Democracy and Education in twentieth‐century Latin America

Do democratic electoral systems strengthen a country's outcomes in education? Does the degree of inclusiveness of a democratic system matter? This article offers evidence that political competition and the inclusion of marginalized populations in electoral systems transformed education over an 80‐year period in Latin America. It finds that democracy has a positive effect on education enrollment and illustrates how current work on democracy and development has overlooked important democratic subcomponents, specifically, who votes and how. Our results deepen current work on democracy, operationalizing the impact of electoral expansion in comparative analysis and showing how democracies respond to specific education demands.     

Democracy and climate change policies: Is history important?

This paper argues that it is countries' historical experience with democracy, the democratic capital stock, rather than current levels of democracy that determines current climate change policies. Empirical evidence using data starting as far back as year 1800 for 87 countries, which together are responsible for 93.7% of global carbon emissions, suggests that the democratic capital stock has an important and robust effect on climate change policies. A history of executive constraints is particularly important. The current level of democracy does not play a role once democratic capital has been accounted for.     

公民参与在公共政策制定中的意义

公民参与在公共政策的整个运行过程中,充分保障广大人民群众的主人翁地位,真正贯彻公共政策的民主化原则,制定出科学、合理、公正的公共政策,以实现公共政策的有效性中的意义是极其重大而深远的。公民参与也是民主程序的核心概念,“真正的民主,需要通过‘公民不断的参与’,方能领略什么是民主,在心理上融会和建立民主作风,在行为上获取民主办事的技巧和方法,这样才可以保证社会运作是真正由人民主宰。”     

“政治学的诺贝尔奖”与当代比较政治学的科学追求——亚当·卓沃尔斯基关于民主与发展的研究介绍

亚当·卓沃尔斯基在研究国家经济发展水平与民主转型之间的关系方面做出了杰出贡献,因而获得2010年度约翰·斯凯特政治科学奖。主要贡献表现为以下三方面：第一,就民主体制的生成问题,他的研究打破了在研究民主转型问题上的经济决定论的迷思,并验证了民主体制在生存问题上对经济发展水平的依赖性。第二,就政治体制对经济发展的影响问题,他的研究表明在大规模的跨国比较分析中,看不出不同的政治体制（民主的或非民主的）对经济发展有什么系统的影响。第三,从根本上改变了比较研究的分析思路,把比较政治学分析从过去着重于类别比较分析,提高到重视科学检验一般性理论陈述的境界,而且强调重视选择偏差机制对样本分布的影响,从而科学地分析表象后面深层的因果关系问题。     

Democracy and Economic Growth in an Interdependent World

We model dynamic interdependence in cross‐country economic growth processes by allowing it to vary according to democratic distance among economies. Stochastic distributional dynamics and temporal effects of democracy on economic growth are studied, and spatial variation in economic growth is explored. Among important results, democratic poverty trap is found to exist indicating the possibility of persistence of (un)stable democratic equilibria at different levels of democracy. Our cross‐sectional regression evinces that democracy has exerted significant growth‐enhancing effect and that the democratic distribution has steadily shifted locus from low‐level to high‐level equilibrium. Our spatial analysis of democracy‐economic growth nexus provide evidence of significant dynamic spatial autocorrelation and complementarity among countries' growth processes. Finally, it is demonstrated that the relevance of geographical proximity in facilitating interdependence in economic growth is overshadowed by relational proximity.     

British colonialism and democracy: Divergent inheritances and diminishing legacies

Did British colonial rule promote post-independence democracy? We provide evidence that the relationship follows a strong temporal pattern. Former British colonies were considerably more democratic than other countries immediately following independence, but subsequent democratic convergence has largely eliminated these differences in the post-Cold War period. Existing theories expounding superior British culture or alternative colonial institutions cannot account for divergent inheritances and diminishing legacies. To explain the time-varying pattern, we analyze European powers’ varying policy approaches to decolonization as well as changes in the international system. Britain more consistently treated competitive democratic elections as a prerequisite for gaining independence, leading to higher initial democracy levels. However, nascent democracies that lacked deep-rooted societal transformation faced challenges to democratic consolidation because of Cold War superpower competition. Later shifts in the international system toward promoting democracy further contributed to convergence by destabilizing colonially rooted dictatorships.     

Economic downturns,inequality, and democratic improvements

This paper explores the extent to which discrete improvements in the democratic quality of political institutions can be explained by income inequality. Empirical tests of this relationship have generally yielded null results, though typically test an unconditional relationship. Guided by a theoretical nuance of the “new economic view” of democratization and using an instrumental variable strategy, we re-examine the relationship conditional on the state of the macroeconomy. We demonstrate that the more unequal are societies, the higher the probability of experiencing democratic improvements following economic downturns. Following growth periods, higher income inequality has a slight negative or null effect on the likelihood of democratic improvement. The conditional result provides a simple explanation for why previous literature has found largely null results concerning inequality and democratization and offers additional evidence in support of the new economic view.     

Does democracy affect taxation and government spending? Evidence from developing countries

Focusing on developing countries in three geographical areas (South-East Asia, Latin America and European Union), we explore the relation between political variables and tax revenue, public spending and their structure. We build a new dataset for the 1990–2005 period with fiscal, political and socio-economic variables. Since democracy is a complex and multidimensional concept, we measure it using two variables, the political strength of democratic institutions, and the protection of civil liberties. We perform three sets of estimates: (i) cross-country pooled OLS regressions with region fixed effects, (ii) country fixed effects regressions and (iii) region specific regressions with country fixed effects. While the first model delivers some significant correlations between political variables and tax items, when controlling for country fixed effects we find that tax revenue and tax composition are in general not significantly correlated with the strength of democratic institutions and the protection of civil liberties. The only exceptions are indirect, trade and property taxes. A similar result applies to public spending, with the exception of defense expenditure. Overall, our findings cast some doubt on the exact public policy channels through which political institutions affect economic development.     

When do neoliberal economic reforms cause democratic decline? Evidence from the post-communist Southeast Europe

Do neoliberal reforms (notably, austerity policy) facilitate democratic decline and the gradual deconstruction of democratic institutions? I examine the democratic development of the Western Balkan countries since 2008 by focusing on the two most recent cases of democratic rollback in Macedonia and Serbia. Neoliberal reforms may create a preference to shut down democratic institutions, because such reforms are socially costly and politically risky. However, democratic backsliding is not possible without opportunity. I illustrate this with reference to the examples of Hungary and Croatia. Croatia implemented some neoliberal policies after 2015, but did not see a drop in its democracy score. By contrast, Hungary moved towards centrally planned capitalism, nationalisation and state interventionism (all opposed to the neoliberal concept of reform), and yet saw a significant democratic decline after 2010. The opportunity to dismantle democratic institutions was a consequence of an electoral gap (a difference in vote share between former and new incumbents), which enabled the rise of authoritarian leaders in Macedonia, Hungary and Serbia.     

Making Economic Policy in a Democratic Indonesia: The First Two Decades

After three decades of rapid economic growth during the authoritarian Soeharto era, followed by the deep but relatively short‐lived Asian financial crisis, Indonesia transitioned rapidly to democratic and decentralized governance. We examine policy‐making processes and economic outcomes during the first two decades of this new era, leading up to the 2019 national elections where it was widely conjectured that Indonesia might follow the global trends of authoritarian rule and illiberalism. We conclude that, thus far, Indonesia has navigated the transition from authoritarian to democratic rule quite successfully. Compared to the Soeharto era, growth has been somewhat slower, inequality has risen, and policy reform is slower and generally incremental. But living standards continue to rise and all major political players have elected to operate within the new democratic parameters. Macroeconomic management has continued to be effective. Nevertheless, there are no grounds for complacency: there is a large outstanding reform agenda, and the economy is not providing enough economic opportunities for the better‐educated senior secondary and tertiary graduates entering the workforce.     

Do remittances improve political institutions? Evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa

Do remittances represent a significant positive determinant of democratic institutions in Sub-Saharan Africa? In this paper, we estimate the effect that remittances have on democratic institutions in Sub-Saharan Africa over the period 1975–2014. Using a 5-year non-overlapping panel sample and controlling for country and time fixed effects, we find that remittances are positively associated with democratic institutions. Our baseline system-GMM estimates indicate that a one standard deviation increase in remittance flows improves democratic institutions by around 0.32 standard deviations. Furthermore, we find that remittances improve democratic institutions by increasing schooling and reducing poverty.     

DEMOCRATIC AID AND THE DEMOCRATIZATION OF RECIPIENTS

We investigate whether democratic aid flows, which are directed toward the democratization of recipients by covering democracy‐related programs and government and civil society activities, affect the future political regime of recipient countries. We introduce a multinomial multivariate logit model and we use 5‐yr averaged data covering the period 1972–2004 for 59 democracy aid‐recipient countries categorized into three broad classes according to the prevalent political regime. We find strong evidence that democratic aid flows are positively associated with the likelihood of observing a partly democratic or a fully democratic political regime in democratic aid‐recipient countries and that this result is robust to the potential endogeneity of democratic assistance.(JEL D70, F35, C25)     

The effect of remittances on democratic institutions

Do remittances promote stronger democratic institutions in developing countries? We study the effect of workers’ remittances on the quality of democracy in developing countries, and examine how government spending mediates the effect of workers’ remittances on the quality of democratic institutions. Using a dynamic panel estimator on data from 133 developing countries over 1972–2012, we find that workers’ remittances improve the quality of democratic institutions. We also find that workers’ remittances are more effective in promoting democratic institutions in developing countries with low government spending.     

由苏联实践引发的社会主义模式再思考

在近百年社会主义的实践中,由于对马克思主义理解上的不同,导致人们对社会主义模式争论不休。对苏联社会主义模式的评判就是这种分歧和争论的集中表现。考茨基和托洛茨基作为苏联社会主义模式构建的见证者和亲历者,从民主社会主义的角度对苏联模式提出了尖锐批评。当今中国模式虽然不同于苏联模式,但由于历史的渊源关系,不可避免地带有苏联模式的部分印迹。考茨基和托洛茨基等人对苏联模式的批判对中国社会主义模式的完善具有借鉴和参考价值。当前的中国模式所表现出来的主要问题,特别是收入分配不公平等问题,也可以从民主社会主义实践那里得到借鉴。