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Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
Healthy And Unhealthy Responses To American Democratic Institutional Failure, Thomas D'Anieri
Healthy And Unhealthy Responses To American Democratic Institutional Failure, Thomas D'Anieri
CMC Senior Theses
I have set out on the hunch that politics in America “feels different,” that we are frustrated both with our institutions as well as with one another. First, I will seek to empirically verify this claim beyond mere “feelings.” If it can be shown that these kinds of discontent genuinely exist to the extent that I believe they do, I will then explain why people feel this way and why things are different this time from the economic, political, and social points of view. Next, I will examine two potential responses, what I will call the populist and the institutional …
Democratic Strength And Terrorism: An Economic Approach, Brian P. Winter
Democratic Strength And Terrorism: An Economic Approach, Brian P. Winter
CMC Senior Theses
There has been much literature about the economic effects of terrorism in democratic countries, but this literature often considers democracy to be a binary variable. This paper sought to explore how the effects might differ depending on the strength of a democracy. In the end, I found that the numbers of attacks and the effects of those attacks do not follow a linear path. The results for autocracies and anocracies require further analysis, but democracies have revealed interesting results. It seems that democracies as a whole have more terrorist attacks, but, within this group, the more democratic a country is …
From Riches To Rags: The Political Economy Of The Natural Resource Curse, Anum Malkani
From Riches To Rags: The Political Economy Of The Natural Resource Curse, Anum Malkani
CMC Senior Theses
The natural resource curse paradox has given rise to a wide range of explanations, which look at the economic, social and political characteristics of resource-rich countries. This paper focuses on the political economy of natural resources and finds that controlling for sociopolitical factors eliminates the natural resource curse. The analysis then turns to these sociopolitical factors and examines the significant, complex and varied effects of democratization on economic growth in general, as well as in resource-rich countries in particular. I conclude that the type of institutions needed for economic development in resource-rich countries are not specific to either democratic or …
India’S Unlikely Democracy: Economic Growth And Political Accommodation, Aseema Sinha
India’S Unlikely Democracy: Economic Growth And Political Accommodation, Aseema Sinha
CMC Faculty Publications and Research
There is no doubt that India’s democracy has become stable, yet economic change could create distributional conflicts and stresses on its democratic institutions. Economic change and liberalization have served to reinforce and further stabilize democracy rather than undermining it. This has happened partly because of the nature of economic and social transition, which has allowed the rich many options in the private, urban, and global economy. Simultaneously, the poor are divided and seek redress through electoral and democratic channels. Weak coalition governments in the 1990s have responded to claims from the poor contributing to the continuing stability of Indian democracy.
War And Democracy, Gregory Hess, Athanasios Orphanides
War And Democracy, Gregory Hess, Athanasios Orphanides
CMC Faculty Publications and Research
We present a general equilibrium model of conflict to investigate whether the prevalence of democracy is sufficient to foster the perpetual peace hypothesized by Immanuel Kant and whether the world would necessarily become more peaceful as more countries adopt democratic institutions. Our exploration suggests that neither hypothesis is true. The desire of incumbent leaders with unfavorable economic performance to hold on to power generates an incentive to initiate conflict and salvage their position—with some probability. An equilibrium with positive war frequency is sustained even if all nations were to adopt representative democratic institutions and even in the absence of an …