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List of figures
Figure 1 The demographic transition ... 4
Figure 2 Life expectancies and birth rates ... 18
Figure 3 Consequences of the demographic transition ... 19
Figure 4 Determinants of democracy... 19
Figure 5 Development of democracy and demography ... 20
Figure 6 5-year average values of democracy scores and the demographic transition ...XVII
List of tables
Table 1 OLS model ... 22
Table 2 Country fixed effects ... 26
Table 3 Country and year fixed effects ... 29
Table 4 Interactions with income ... 31
Table 5 Time of demographic transition ... 34
Table 6 Summary of channel analysis... 37
List of Abbreviations
FE: Fixed effects
GDP: Gross domestic product
HAC: Heteroskedasticity-and autocorrelation- consistent
HR: Heteroskedasticity-robust
iid: independent and identically distributed
OLS: Ordinary Least Squares
OVB: Omitted variable bias
WDI: World Development Indicators
3SLS: Three Stage Least Squares
1.
Introduction
"[...] in many ways demographic change can and should be seen as an essential factor of change
that has profound implications for society" (Reher, 2011, p.12).
The demographic transition
1
has been part of a global transition process that involved changes in
politics, economics and society in almost every country. These different processes all have
partially overlapping causes and consequences. Therefore, it seems obvious that these
movements of change are all interrelated, which is supported by an abundance of research on
causal relationships between economic growth and democracy as well as between economic
growth and the demographic transition. However, only few works focus on interdependencies
between the demographic transition and democratization, even though these two processes
happened roughly at the same time and are therefore likely to influence each other. Thus, the
goal of this paper is to analyze the relationship between the demographic transition and
democracy and the possible channels through which their influences take effect
2
.
First of all, the direction of causality has to be identified in this context. Dyson (2010) and Reher
(2011) classify the onset of mortality decline, which constitutes the starting point of the
demographic transition as an exogenous event. One might argue that the demographic transition
is linked to a country's health level, which in turn depends on a country's political system because
only in democratic countries medicine is distributed equally and investments in health are
undertaken. While this holds true in a not globalized world, in modern times basic health care is
provided through the international community. Hence, differences in the standard of health care
caused by the respective political systems are not large enough to cause a demographic transition.
Therefore, the direction of causation from democracy to demography can be neglected.
Democratization very much depends on factors such as education, income, urbanization and
women's empowerment, which can be identified as consequences of the demographic transition.
Hence, the dominant direction of causation seems to go from demography to democracy. The
demographic transition brings about the effect on these factors in the following way:
1
Characterized as transition from high mortality and fertility rates to low mortality and fertility rates.
Declining mortality rates (and thereby rising life expectancies) followed by falling fertility rates, eventually,
lead to a higher proportion of old people in society.
2
holding income constant
1
Higher life expectancies and fewer children per family increase investments in education and
thereby raise a country's educational level. Due to changing age structures and better health
conditions, more people are part of a country's labor force increasing its productivity and
eventually resulting in economic growth. Fewer children also support women's empowerment
since women have more personal free time besides caring for the household and can participate
in the labor force as well. Finally, changing age structures and higher life expectancies also lead to
urbanization: more people move to cities due to better employment opportunities and
improvements in the health level, which affect mortality rates in cities more than in rural areas
because in cities the danger of infectious diseases is much higher.
Furthermore, education, income, women's empowerment and urbanization affect democracy,
which is established
in most major works on democracy, as for example by Lipset (1959),
Huntington (1991) and Barro (1999).
Hence, it is likely that an exogenous demographic transition causes better education, higher
income, women's empowerment and urbanization, which in turn leads to democracy.
An empirical analysis therefore tests the hypotheses whether the demographic transition has a
statistically significant influence on democracy and, if that is the case, through which channels
this influence takes effect. For this purpose, panel data from more than 150 countries since 1800
are examined using different linear pooled ordinary least squares and linear fixed effect models.
In addition, interactions with income are tested and a channel analysis is executed. In order to
ensure the exogeneity of the demographic transition suitable control variables, most importantly
per capita income, are included.
Quantifying these effects is important because an advanced understanding of the determinants of
democracy facilitates more profound forecasts for democratization movements all over the world
and provides guidelines to influence these processes as policy maker. This is highly relevant since
many political instable African and Asian countries, such as Congo, Somalia, Afghanistan and
Yemen, are currently undergoing the demographic transition or have just completed this process.
The paper is organized as follows: the topic is introduced by first explaining the motivating
theory by giving an overview of the literature concerning the demographic transition and
determinants of democracy and by demonstrating the connection between these two subjects.
Based on the theoretical part the econometrical analysis subsequently follows and finally leads to
a conclusion about the stated hypotheses.
2
2.
Motivating Theory
Many authors argue that the demographic transition is part of a global transition process not only
involving demographic but also social, economic and political changes
3
. This temporal parallelism
of change processes in economics, politics, demography and on the social level gives rise to the
assumption that they are all interrelated.
While the focus of previous research lay mainly on the relationships between economics and
democracy
4
or demography and economics
5
this paper focuses on the interdependencies between
the demographic transition and democratization processes. For this purpose the consequences of
the demographic transition and determinants of democracy are analyzed.
2.1.
The demographic transition
Thompson already assumed in 1929 that certain historical stages of nations are linked to their
regarding mortality and fertility rates. Notestein (1945) then developed a more detailed four-stage
model based on observations in the Western World. His findings demonstrate that mortality rates
start to decline at one point in the history of a country while fertility rates remain high, which
leads to population growth. With a delay, however, fertility rates start to decline as well and once
mortality and fertility rates both reach a low steady state the population stops growing. An
illustration of this process according to Sunde&Cervelatti
6
(2011, p. 103) is presented in figure 1.
MT denotes the onset of the mortality transition, which is succeeded by population growth. With
a time delay fertility rates start to decline as well (FT) and thus population growth slows down.
This process is called "demographic transition", which is defined in this paper by two criterions
that have to be fulfilled by a country in order to be classified as post-transitional
7
: the life
expectancy has to be above fifty and crude birthrates
8
below thirty. These criterions are two out
of three used by Sunde&Cervelatti (2011, p.107) in accordance with Chesnais' (1992, p.19)
norms. The third one, a sustained decline in fertility, is hard to quantify and left out because the
3
See, for example, Dyson (2010) or Reher (2011)
4
Barro (1996), Glaeser et al. (2004), Acemoglu et al. (2008),
5
Bloom,Canning&Sevilla (2001), Reher (2011), Lorentzen,McMillan&Wacziarg (2005),
Acemoglu&Johnson (2006), Cervelatti&Sunde(2011)
6
The figure reproduces Fig. 1.1 from Chesnais (1992) and Fig. 4.2 from Livi-Bacci (1992).
7
Post-transitional: Countries that experienced the onset of the demographic transition
8
Crude birth rates denote the number of births per 1000 people per year
3
criterion of crude birth rates below thirty is more restrictive and therefore ensures the satisfaction
of the third criterion as well.
Another definition of demographic transition is given by Reher (2004, p.21), who identifies the
starting point as "the beginning of the first quinquennium after a peak, where fertility declines by
at least 8% over two quinquennia and never increases again to levels approximating the original
take-off point" (Reher, 2004, p.21). The dates of the demographic transition computed by
employing above mentioned criterions as well as Reher's specification are presented in appendix
B.1.
Thus, a pre-transitional society with high mortality and fertility rates is rather young compared to
a post-transitional society that is characterized by higher life expectancies and lower fertility rates.
A society's changing age structure is considered as one of the most important features of the
demographic transition (Reher, 2011, p.14).
Figure 1 The demographic transition
Empirical studies confirm that a general pattern of an antecedent mortality decline and a
following fertility decline exists, even though the time lag between these two developments
differs across countries
9
. Reher (2004), for example, observed this demographic process in most
countries in the past 150 years and categorizes countries according to the date of their
demographic transition, whereby he identifies four groups. The first group constitutes the
"forerunners", whose fertility decline started before 1935 and which are mainly European and a
few American countries. The so-called "followers" are countries that experienced their fertility
decline between 1950 and 1964 and are either somehow influenced by the Europeans, via power
regimes or ethnicity, or countries that are distinguished because of their special regional position
such as India, Singapore and Japan. The fertility decline of the third group took place between
1965 and 1979 and therefore, this group is labeled "trailers", which includes the rest of Latin
America and some African and Asian countries. The last group is referred to as the "latecomers",
whose demographic transition started only after 1980 and which consists of some Asian and
9
See for example Coale (1975)
4
most of the African countries
10
. It is important to note that the general pattern of the
demographic transition has been the same in all countries - only the time of the onset and the
duration of the transition differ.
There is, however, no consensus about possible causes of the mortality decline because it
occurred worldwide under different circumstances and, thus, no one has succeeded in
establishing a general pattern, which could be employed to explain the occurrence of the
demographic transition in all countries yet. Therefore, some authors, such as Dyson (2010) and
Reher (2011)
11
, claim that the demographic transition occurs exogenously.
As opposed to this exogeneity assumption, one might argue that health care (and thereby the
occurrence of a demographic transition) is linked to a country's income and its political system.
That is, because only rich nations can afford medicine and only democratic nations have an
interest in distributing it, which would mean that the onset of the demographic transition
depends on a country's political and economic situation
12
. Globalization, however, raised
awareness for the health situation worldwide and international organizations as well as foreign
governments have started to provide basic health care for people in less developed countries.
Furthermore, globalization facilitates the adoption of new medical inventions and progress in
research so that even poor countries can benefit from the latest scientific achievements. This
means that in a globalized world a country's income and political system are not strong enough
to cause a demographic transition.
Thus, the argument that income or the political system have a significant effect on the
demographic transition might be valid for the 18
th
and 19
th
century- in modern times, however,
national income and democracy levels only play a minor role in determining a country's health
situation
13
.
Besides from income and the political system as the main threats to the exogeneity assumption of
the demographic transition, other factors such as education, women's empowerment and
10
See appendix B.1 for a summary of the Reher-groups
11
Canning (2011,p.3): "tackling the central thesis of the book [Dyson's Population and development,
2010] which is that the demographic transition is a largely self-contained process that proceeds
independently of social and economic development. The argument is that the mortality transition occurs
exogenously and is the cause of a subsequent decline in fertility "
Reher (2004,p. 12): The demographic transition "is considered as a largely autonomous process".
12
Franco et al. (2004) and Cutler et al. (2006), for example, argue that political institutions significantly
affect health and Pritchett &Summers (1996) state that income has a significant effect on health.
13
Smith (2003) and Adams et al. (2003) find that changes in income and lagged values of income do not
predict changes in health.
Christopher Martyn questions the strength of the evidence for politics being a determinant of health in
Franco's paper (2004) (p.1423)
5
urbanization might still be correlated with the occurrence of the demographic transition.
Therefore, the empirical models account for these factors. Hence following analyses consider the
demographic transition as a predominantly exogenous event.
2.2.
Democracy
There exist a variety of definitions of democracy and the most common ones in recent literature
are based on Schumpeter's (1947) characterization
14
, such as, for example, Huntington's
(1991,p.6) description: "The central procedure of democracy is the selection of leaders through
competitive elections by the people they govern". He points out the significance of a free and fair
election process in order to show the importance of a high participation rate to achieve a
"people's rule"
15
.
Lipset (1959), in accordance with Schumpeter (1947) and Weber (1946), defines three conditions
that classify a democracy: Firstly, a "political formula", which is a value system that legitimizes
the system, specifies institutions and is accepted by all citizens, is necessary. Secondly, one set of
political leaders in office is as important as, thirdly, several sets of political leaders out of office
that form an opposition. Furthermore, "opportunities for changing governing officials" (p.71)
have to be allowed and the "largest possible part of the population" (p.71) has to be able to
influence political decisions. He thereby underlines not only the necessity of a balanced
distribution of power to avoid conflicts and autocratic movements, but also the necessity of equal
and free participation opportunities for the citizens.
The concepts of freedom along with equality among all citizens appear in most work about
democracy and are therefore the underlying definition applied in this paper. The criterions to
quantify this definition are discussed in the empirical part.
In 2011, 87 countries, representing 43 percent of the global population, are considered
democracies, while 48 countries, representing 35 percent of the world's population, are classified
as "not free" according to Freedom House
16
. The degree of freedom and democratization in the
14
"The democratic method is that institutional arrangement for arriving at political decisions in which
individuals acquire the power to decide by means of a competitive struggle for the people's vote" (as cited
in Barro, 1999, p. 160).
15
"Democracy" comes from the Greek words
(dmos) meaning "people" and (kratos)
meaning "power"
16
The number of countries qualifying as partly free stood at 60 and they were home to 22 percent of the
world's total population (http://www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world-2012/full-report-essay).
Freedom House is a US-based non-governmental organization that supports democratic change, monitors
freedom, and advocates democracy and human rights around the world.
6
world is higher than ever before in history. But still, more than half of the world's population
lives in unfree or only partially free countries. Questions regarding reasons for democratization
movements are often raised in this context, for example: which factors determine democracy and
the different timing of democratization processes?
The temporally different occurrence of democratizations is examined most famously by Samuel
Huntington, who identifies three different democratization waves
17
, each succeeded by reverse
movements. The first wave had its origins in the American and French revolution and took place
during the relatively long period between 1828 and 1926 mainly in Europe, but also in North
America and in a few Latin American countries. The second one occurred after World War II,
when Allied occupation promoted democratization processes, most of Latin America
democratized and the end of Western colonial rule produced new states, some of which became
democratic as well. The third wave started in 1974 and includes many democratization processes
in Latin America and South and Eastern Europe after the collapse of the Soviet Union
(Huntington, 1993, p.13 f.)
18
.
An abundance of authors addressed the question about causes for democratizations and detected
determinants reaching from economic to historical and social factors. Most major works on
democratization- except Acemoglu et al. (2008)- agree that economic factors are favorable for
democracies. They, however, have not reached a consensus concerning the exact pattern of these
effects
19
.
Other discussed determinants of democracy include education, health, social institutions, religion,
historic factors (such as, for example, a colonial history), urbanization, ethnologic fragmentation
and geography
20
. Analyzing all these factors would go beyond the scope of this paper, and
therefore the focus in following sections lies on factors that are at the same time considered as
possible consequences of the demographic transition.
17
"A wave of democratization is a group of transitions from nondemocratic to democratic regimes that
occur within a specified period of time and that significantly outnumber transitions in the opposite
direction during that period of time"(Huntington, 1993, 15)
18
See appendix B.2 for a summary of countries belonging to the different democratization-waves
19
See Lipset (1959), Huntington (1991), Rusechemeyer,Stephens&Stephens (1992) or Barro (1999)
20
Lipset (1959), Huntington (1991), Barro (1999), Papaioannou and Siourounis (2006), Glaeser et al.
(2007), Hegre et al. (2012)
7
2.3.
Interdependencies between the demographic transition and democracy
Since the demographic transition and democratization processes often happened roughly at the
same time, it is surprising that only a limited amount of literature focuses on the political
consequences of demographic transitions while many authors examine the effects on the
economy and on society.
As explained in section 2.1, the occurrence of a demographic transition is, in modern times,
largely independent from the political system. Thus, the following section analyzes reasons and
possible channels through which demography influences democracy. While the reverse direction
of causation cannot be ruled out completely, the causation from the demographic transition to
democracy is considered as the dominant direction.
As one of the few authors who addresses the political implications of a demographic transition,
Dyson (2010) points out the higher confidence people have in their future after the demographic
transition and the resulting increased awareness for political matters. "The rise in the number of
years that they could reasonably expect to live, surely had an influence in helping people to think
more about issues of justice and political equity" (p. 202). Moreover, he emphasizes certain
outcomes of the transition such as urbanization and population ageing that eventually lead to
democratization.
Another approach was developed by Cincotta (2007), who argues that political systems in pre-
transitional, young societies are more likely to be instable than in post-transitional societies. This
youth bulge argument, derived from civil conflict research
21
, is connected with the logic of
authoritarian bargains
22
in order to explain the occurrence of authoritarian regimes in pre-
transitional societies. That is, before the demographic transition political instability is more likely
to occur due to the young age structure of society and because of this insecure environment
people are willing to exchange political rights for security. Hence, democracy is less likely to arise
in pre-transitional than in older, post-transitional societies. This argumentation is based on the
assumption that if people do not have a reason (in this case higher levels of security) to call for an
authoritarian regime the chances for democracy increase. Cincotta's approach, therefore, rather
focuses on the determinants of authoritarian regimes than on the determinants of democracy.
21
See Goldstone (1991, 2001) and Collier (2000) for theoretical explenantion and Urdal (2006) for
empirical evidence
22
"The social contract in dictatorships is commonly explained as an "authoritarian baragain" between
rulers and citizens by which citizens relinquish political rights for economic security" (Desai, Olofsgard,
Yusuf, 2009, Abstract)
8
This paper, however, focuses on the direct effects of the demographic transition and its
consequences on democracy and consequently follows Dyson's approach (2010). It is likely that
longer time horizons and more life experience promote democracy because people have a
broader array of perspectives and are able to evaluate a political system more critically. In
addition, the longer people expect to live and work in a society the more they want to participate
in the political system that sets the general framework for how society works. Furthermore, more
life experience also makes people more familiar with different political systems and the respective
advantages and disadvantages. Thus, a movement towards democracy is more probable in
societies with higher life expectancies than in others.
Besides from the effect of higher life expectancies on democracy, consequences of the
demographic transition such as education, urbanization, women's empowerment and economic
growth also play an important role since they are at the same time determinants of democracy.
There might also be other factors that connect the demographic transition and democracy. The
aforementioned ones, however, seem to be the most significant ones
and therefore the focus in
the following course of this paper will lay on these four.
In order to deduce these relationships, the subsequent sections explain these factors with respect
to the effect the demographic transition has on each one of them and the influence of these
factors on democracy.
2.3.1.
Education
Lower fertility rates and higher life expectancies do not only change the structure of society as a
whole, but also family structures. Fewer children per family increase the share of disposable
income for each child's education and higher life expectancies increase the return on investments
in education. Declining mortality rates also increase the incentive for societal investments in
education because society benefits from an educated labor force for a longer time period. Bar and
Leukhina (2011) argue that lower mortality rates lead to better knowledge transmission because
individuals are carriers of ideas, which also contributes to a higher level of education in post-
transitional societies than in others. Empirical studies support the positive relationship between
the demographic transition and education as well (e.g. Lorentzen, 2005).
The second part of the argument - the influence of education on democracy - is a rather old field
of study. John Dewey argued in favor of education to obtain democracy as early as 1916 because
in educated societies people understand political contexts better, are encouraged to think about
different forms of governance and question critically the current political situation. In the past
9
fifteen years, however, a passionate debate about the empirical evidence for this relationship has
arisen. Barro (1999), for example, states in his study about the origins of democracy that the
propensity for democracy rises with years of schooling. Even though Acemoglu (2005) criticizes
Barro's and other's studies for using wrong models
23
and, in his analysis, finds no evidence for a
link between education and democracy, many other authors succeeding him, who use revised and
more sophisticated models such as Glaeser et. al (2006), Papaioanou et al. (2008),Wacziarg (2011)
and Hegre el. al (2012), support the idea of a causal relationship between education and
democracy theoretically as well as empirically.
Hence, democracy is very likely to occur in more educated societies. After a demographic
transition people invest more in education, a better knowledge transfer takes place and more
people have more time to study so that better education is a direct result of this transition and
thereby is one element that connects the demographic transition and democracy.
2.3.2.
Urbanization
"Any account of the demographic transition that fails to include urbanization as one of its major
components is seriously incomplete" (Dyson, 2011). Studies on urbanization often refer to
economic changes to explain a drift towards cities. Mortality rates and population growth,
however, are an important determinant of urbanization as well. Therefore, de Vries (1990)
developed the ,,stylized sector-specific model of the demographic transition" and its implications
for urban growth. In pre-transitional times, death rates in urban areas are usually higher than in
rural areas because infectious diseases, communicated by contagion in confined space, were the
main cause for high mortality rates. The demographic transition then reduced mortality rates
through better health care, with the result that the urban mortality rate fall more rapidly than the
rural mortality rate. Thus, the urban population increased faster than the rural population as long
as the birthrate was higher than the death rate. Once birth and death rates reached the same level,
the process of the demographic transition was completed and the result was an increase of the
urban population. Another connection between the demographic transition and urbanization is a
temporary strong population growth in general, which does not only contribute to relative faster
growth of cities compared to rural areas but also to new city foundings, resulting in absolute
urban growth. Empirical evidence for the relationship between the demographic transition and
urbanization is given by Woods (2003). In addition, Dyson (2010, 2011) and Canning (2011)
establish a similar argumentation and agree that mortality decline increased the urban population.
23
According to Acemoglu country and time fixed effects are crucial for regressions that estimate the effect
of education on democracy.
10
Urbanization as a determinant of democracy is extensively discussed since "democracy made its
first effective appearance in the Greek city states" (Laski, 1937, p. 76). Max Weber (1950, p. 315)
characterizes cities as a certain type of political community, which is confirmed by Lipset's
analysis about the requisites of democracy (1960)
24
. One of the main arguments in this discussion
is that people in cities can organize themselves more easily and have a better notion of
inequalities and the political situation, which promotes exercising political rights and democratic
movements. Moreover, cities are characterized by a growing middle class
25
, which is often
identified as an important component of democracy (Lipset, 1959).
Dyson (2010) emphasizes the different distribution of political power in cities, which is promoted
through new administrative and governance structures that become necessary in urban areas. But
he also argues that democracy can only arise in moderate growing cities because cities growing
too quickly, which have to deal with space problems, involve the danger of civil conflict and
political unrest.
Barro (1999), on the other hand, claims that according to his empirical studies democracy tends
to fall in line with urbanization, but does not give a profound theoretical explanation for this
negative relationship. Therefore, these results could have either occurred due to theoretical
explanations, which have not been covered so far
26
or due to estimation errors. Since the majority
of authors, however, argue in favor of a positive relationship between urbanization and
democratization this paper follows this approach.
Urban governance structures, a broader middle class and better communication facilities than in
rural areas all have a positive effect on democratization. Thus, urbanization can be seen as
another outcome of the demographic transition that causes democratization.
2.3.3.
Women's empowerment
Declining fertility rates have a huge impact on women's lives because caring for fewer children
gives them more time to spend, for example, at school or at work. Being more educated and
pursuing a profession also goes along with becoming independent, self-confident and accepting
social and political responsibilities. There are many empirical studies that find a large negative
effect of a high fertility rate on female labor force participation (Bloom, Canning, Fink, Finlay,
2009) and on female economic and political empowerment (Canning, 2010). Dyson (2001, 2010)
24
See also Mumford (1995, p.21) and Amin & Thrift (2004, p. 231) and their argumentation in favor of a
positive correlation between cities and democracy
25
The middle class grows in cities extraordinary fast due to the economic structure of cities (new type of
occupations are available)
26
For example that autocratic regimes can control cities easier than other areas
11
also claims that fertility and mortality declines lead to a reduction in gender differentiation and
higher female autonomy.
Women's empowerment contributes to democratization because equality and broad participation
are its prerequisites. Barro (1999) agrees with this position by stating that "democracy is also
negatively and significantly related to the gap between male and female primary attainment",
meaning that higher levels of democracy can be reached in more equal societies. Waylan (1996)
emphasizes the substantial role of women in bringing about the collapse of authoritarianism in
Latin America and Eastern Europe.
Consequently, the demographic transition, particularly fertility decline, promotes women's
empowerment, which in light of higher equality among the citizens determines democracy.
2.3.4.
Economic growth
There are several arguments in favor of a positive influence of the demographic transition on
economic growth. Higher life expectancies and more people in an employable age increase the
labor force, and it becomes more productive through higher health levels (Bloom, Canning,
Sevilla, 2001). Lorentzen et al. (2005) argue that high pre-transitional mortality rates reduce
economic growth because they shorten time horizons and lead to risky behavior and lower
investments in physical and human capital. They also see mortality rates as a source of the
poverty trap because poor health conditions and a weak economy reinforce each other. Hence,
post-transitional societies are characterized by better prerequisites for economic growth. Not
only Galor and his Unified Growth Theory (2011), but also Canning (2011), in accordance with
Dyson (2010) and Dahan & Tsiddon (1998) suggests that the demographic transition played a
major role in the emergence of economic growth, primarily because of mortality decline and age-
structural changes. This relationship was questioned by Acemoglu & Johnson (2006), who do not
obtain evidence that large increases in life expectancy lead to increases in per capita income.
Sunde&Cervelatti (2011), however, find in post-transitional times a positive relationship of life
expectancy on economic growth, even though the effect before the demographic transition is
ambiguous. Hence, according to the overwhelming majority of literature, economic growth is at
least partially determined by the demographic transition.
The tendency that richer countries are often more democratic can be observed worldwide. If
there is a direct connection between income and democracy is, however, controversial. While
Acemoglu et al. (2008) did not find evidence for a causal relationship in empirical studies, Barro
(1999), for example, did. Most major works on democracy (Lipset,1959, Huntington 1991,
12
Rueschmeyer/Stephens/Stephens, 1992, Tavres/Wacziarg, 2000, Murtin/Wacziarg, 2011)
consider economic performance as a determinant perhaps even the main one. They argue that
wealth is a prerequisite for intelligent participation in political processes since people have the
ability to think about broader questions, such as governance systems, as they are usually better
educated. It also changes the social position of workers and strengthens the middle class, which
has a positive impact on civic participation. Economic growth also weakens the power of a small
economically and therefore often politically leading class and raises the influence of the working
class.
Hence, the demographic transition promotes economic growth, which is a determinant of
democracy so that income is, besides education, urbanization and women's empowerment, a
fourth channel through which demographic transition and democracy are connected.
Accordingly, this analysis yields two hypotheses, which will be examined in the empirical part of
this paper
(1.) The demographic transition has a positive influence on the rise of democracy.
(2.) The effect of the demographic transition on democracy works primarily through the channels
of education, women's empowerment, urbanization and economic growth.
13
3.
Data and descriptive statistics
3.1.
Data
In order to support these hypotheses the following section provides an empirical analysis based
on different linear panel data models for more than 150 countries over the past 200 years. Panal
data are advantageous compared to cross-sectional or time-series data because they ,,usually give
the resarcher a large number of data points, increasing the degrees of freedom and reducing the
collinearity among explanatory variables-hence improving the efficiency of econometric
estimates" (Hsiao, 2003, p.3). Moreover, panel data are particularly useful to analyze the dynamics
of change regarding demography and democracy across different countries. There are, however,
also limitations of using panel data, such as sample selection bias because data availability might
not be equal across countries and years.
Demographic data, such as life expectancy and fertility rates, were taken from the World Bank's
world development indicator database (WDI) and are available since 1960. This database also
contains statistics on education, urbanization, female labor force participation and GDP. GDP
and other economic variables were also drawn from Acemoglu&Johnson (2007) and Banks' cross
national time series database
27
. As another measure of education, the Barro-Lee dataset of
educational attainment in the world is used, which provides data about average years of schooling
in 5-year intervals from 1950 until 2010. As measure for democratization, Polity IV data
28
as "the
most widely used data resource for studying regime change and the effects of regime authority"
29
are employed, which cover the time span from 1800 to 2010 for more than 150 countries. A
detailed description of all variables and sources is given in appendix A.
3.1.1.
Demographic data
The most important demographic data are mortality and fertility rates in order to estimate the
date of the demographic transition. As one measure, a binary variable labeled demographic
transition ("demotran") was created, which turns 1 if life expectancy is higher than fifty and
crude birthrates fall below 30/1000. If one of these criterions is not met the variable stays 0. Life
27
This database was launched by Arthur Banks in 1968 at the State University of New York at
Binghampton and provides data for more than 200 countries from 1815 until 2007 (Arthur S. Banks,
"Cross-National Time-Series Data Archive (CNTS) 1815-2007", http://hdl.handle.net/1902.1/11448
Databanks International [Distributor] V1 [Version])
28
The Polity IV Project is is under the direction of Dr. Monty G. Marshall and supported by the Political
Instability Task Force, Societal-Systems Research, and Center for Systemic Peace.
29
http://www.systemicpeace.org/polity/polity4.htm
14
expectancy as taken from the World Bank dataset is defined as "number of years a newborn
infant would live if prevailing patterns of mortality at the time of its birth were to stay the same
throughout its life"
30
and crude birth reflect the number of live births occurring during the year,
per 1,000 population and are estimated at midyear. As the World Bank data are only available
since 1960, all analyses including the binary variable "demotran" only take
into account countries
that experienced their transition after 1960.
Data about the onset of fertility decline from Reher's analysis (2004)
31
are taken as another
measure for the demographic transition.
The difference between these two measures amounts to 15 years on average with a standard
deviation of 10.3, which is due to the fact that Reher's data underlies a different definition for the
demographic transition than the one applied for the World Bank data. Also, the data of the
World Bank only start in 1960 while Reher's data go back to 1900. Thus, only data for countries
that experienced their demographic transition after 1960 can be compared, which are mainly
African, Asian and some Latin American countries (whose data are less accurate). Taking this
into consideration, the two measures from completely different datasets are quite close in terms
of the time horizon they reflect.
In addition, the time difference between the present and the time of the demographic transition
(yearssincedt)
32
were calculated on the basis of Reher's data. For summary statistics of the
demographic data see appendix C.
In the following course of the analysis WDI data underlie the binary variable "demotran" and
Reher's data are the basis for the continuous variable "years passed since (pending to) the
demographic transition". It is important to keep in mind that the variables reflect different time
horizons
33
and different meanings. While the binary variable "demotran" measures the effect of
the occurrence of the demographic transition (in the past) on democracy today, the continuous
variable represents the effect that years passed since or pending to the demographic transition
have on democracy today. Thus, the results from these different strategies to examine the stated
hypotheses have to be interpreted with respect to their respective time horizon and meaning.
30
http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN
31
Using data from UN Demographic Yearbook Reher defined onset of fertility decline as follows: It "has
been set at the beginning of the first quinquennium after a peak, where fertility declines by at least 8%
over two quinquennia and never increases again to levels approximating the original take-off point"
(Reher, 2004, p.21)
32
This measures contains negative values if the demographic transition lies in the future an spositive
values if a country has already undergone the demographic transition.
33
WDI 1960-2011 and Reher 1865-2000
15
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- , 2014, An econometrical analysis of the interdependencies between the demographic transition and democracy, Hamburg, Diplomica Publishing GmbH, https://www.anchor-publishing.com/document/312720
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