Economy, Politics, and the Debate of Democracy

Abstract

Political scientists debated the causal relations between democracy and the economy, and conventional wisdom suggests that democracy and the economy have a causal relationship in that positive economic conditions should foster the likelihood of democracy because positive economic conditions account for the states of modernity, whereas negative economic conditions should undermine the likelihood of democracy because they account for a country’s backwardness (Lipset, 1959; Deutch, 1964; Dalh 1971). According to conventional wisdom, positive economic conditions bring about the possibility of a transition to democracy; however, this wisdom has been criticized by several political scientists, who suggest that democracy and the economy are not related in terms of causal relationships (Przewroski and Limongi, 1997). The characteristics of political institutions and the roles and decision of political elites are among the factors that political scientists have argued are causally related to democratic transition.