Nothing Special   »   [go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hhs/gunwpe/0280.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Why Are Market Economies Politically Stable? A Theory of Capitalist Cohesion

Author

Listed:
  • Dalgaard, Carl-Johan

    (University of Copenhagen)

  • Olsson, Ola

    (Department of Economics, School of Business, Economics and Law, Göteborg University)

Abstract
The present paper documents that political stability is positively associated with the extent of domestic trade. In explaining this reg- ularity, we provide a model where political cohesion is linked to the emergence of a fully functioning market economy. Without market ex- change, the welfare of inherently selfish individuals will be mutually independent. As a result, political negotiations, echoing the prefer- ences of the citizens of society, will be dog-eat-dog in nature. Whoever has greater bargaining power will be willing to make decisions that en- hance the productivity of his supporters at the expense of other groups in society. If the gains from specialization become sufficiently large, however, a market economy will emerge. From being essentially non- cooperative under self-su¢ ciency, the political decision making process becomes cooperative in the market economy, as the welfare of individ- uals will be mutually interdependent due to the exchange of goods.

Suggested Citation

  • Dalgaard, Carl-Johan & Olsson, Ola, 2007. "Why Are Market Economies Politically Stable? A Theory of Capitalist Cohesion," Working Papers in Economics 280, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:gunwpe:0280
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/2077/8481
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Olson, Mancur, 1963. "Rapid Growth as a Destabilizing Force," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 23(4), pages 529-552, December.
    2. Alesina, Alberto & Perotti, Roberto, 1996. "Income distribution, political instability, and investment," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 40(6), pages 1203-1228, June.
    3. de Vries, Jan, 1994. "The Industrial Revolution and the Industrious Revolution," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 54(2), pages 249-270, June.
    4. Oded Galor & Omer Moav, 2000. "Das Human Kapital," Working Papers 2000-17, Brown University, Department of Economics.
    5. Olsson, Ola & Hansson, Gustav, 2011. "Country size and the rule of law: Resuscitating Montesquieu," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(5), pages 613-629, June.
    6. Douglass C. North, 1991. "Institutions," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 5(1), pages 97-112, Winter.
    7. Daron Acemoglu & James A. Robinson, 2000. "Why Did the West Extend the Franchise? Democracy, Inequality, and Growth in Historical Perspective," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(4), pages 1167-1199.
    8. Robert J. Barro, 1991. "Economic Growth in a Cross Section of Countries," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 106(2), pages 407-443.
    9. Grossman, Herschel I & Kim, Minseong, 1995. "Swords or Plowshares? A Theory of the Security of Claims to Property," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(6), pages 1275-1288, December.
    10. Olsson, Ola, 2007. "Conflict diamonds," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(2), pages 267-286, March.
    11. Douglas Staiger & James H. Stock, 1997. "Instrumental Variables Regression with Weak Instruments," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 65(3), pages 557-586, May.
    12. Voth, Hans-Joachim, 1998. "Time and Work in Eighteenth-Century London," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(1), pages 29-58, March.
    13. Oded Galor & Omer Moav, 2006. "Das Human-Kapital: A Theory of the Demise of the Class Structure," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 73(1), pages 85-117.
    14. Acemoglu, Daron & Johnson, Simon & Robinson, James A. & Yared, Pierre, 2009. "Reevaluating the modernization hypothesis," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(8), pages 1043-1058, November.
    15. Acemoglu,Daron & Robinson,James A., 2009. "Economic Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521671422, October.
    16. Gallup, John L. & Sachs, Jeffrey D. & Mellinger, Andrew, "undated". "Geography and Economic Development," Instructional Stata datasets for econometrics geodata, Boston College Department of Economics.
    17. Stergios Skaperdas & Constantinos Syropoulos, 2001. "Guns, Butter, and Openness: On the Relationship between Security and Trade," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(2), pages 353-357, May.
    18. William Easterly, 2002. "The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists' Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262550423, April.
    19. Mr. Dietrich Vollrath & Mr. Lennart Erickson, 2007. "Land Distribution and Financial System Development," IMF Working Papers 2007/083, International Monetary Fund.
    20. John Luke Gallup & Jeffrey D. Sachs & Andrew D. Mellinger, 1998. "Geography and Economic Development," NBER Working Papers 6849, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    21. Lipset, Seymour Martin, 1959. "Some Social Requisites of Democracy: Economic Development and Political Legitimacy1," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 53(1), pages 69-105, March.
    22. Clark, Gregory & Werf, Ysbrand Van Der, 1998. "Work in Progress? The Industrious Revolution," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(03), pages 830-843, September.
    23. Paul Collier & Anke Hoeffler, 2004. "Greed and grievance in civil war," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 56(4), pages 563-595, October.
    24. Xavier Sala-I-Martin & Gernot Doppelhofer & Ronald I. Miller, 2004. "Determinants of Long-Term Growth: A Bayesian Averaging of Classical Estimates (BACE) Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(4), pages 813-835, September.
    25. Erik Gartzke, 2007. "The Capitalist Peace," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 51(1), pages 166-191, January.
    26. Alesina, Alberto & Özler, Sule & Roubini, Nouriel & Swagel, Phillip, 1996. "Political Instability and Economic Growth," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 1(2), pages 189-211, June.
    27. Michael Kremer, 1993. "Population Growth and Technological Change: One Million B.C. to 1990," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(3), pages 681-716.
    28. Anthony Annett, 2001. "Social Fractionalization, Political Instability, and the Size of Government," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 48(3), pages 1-7.
    29. de Vries,Jan, 1976. "The Economy of Europe in an Age of Crisis, 1600–1750," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521290500, October.
    30. Easterly, William, 1999. "Life during Growth," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 4(3), pages 239-276, September.
    31. John Luke Gallup & Jeffrey D. Sachs & Andrew D. Mellinger, 1998. "Geography and Economic Development," Harvard Institute of Economic Research Working Papers 1856, Harvard - Institute of Economic Research.
    32. Edward Miguel & Shanker Satyanath & Ernest Sergenti, 2004. "Economic Shocks and Civil Conflict: An Instrumental Variables Approach," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 112(4), pages 725-753, August.
    33. Oded Galor & Omer Moav & Dietrich Vollrath, 2005. "Land Inequality and the Emergence of Human Capital Promoting Institutions," Development and Comp Systems 0502018, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Olsson, Ola, 2008. "Resource Conflict in Vulnerable Environments: Three Models Applied to Darfur," Working Papers in Economics 325, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Carl-Johan Dalgaard & Ola Olsson, 2013. "Why Are Rich Countries More Politically Cohesive?," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 115(2), pages 423-448, April.
    2. David Castells-Quintana & Maria del Pilar Lopez-Uribe & Tom McDermott, 2015. "Climate change and the geographical and institutional drivers of economic development," GRI Working Papers 198, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
    3. Lopez-Uribe, Maria del Pilar & Castells-Quintana, David & McDermott, Thomas K. J., 2017. "Geography, institutions and development: a review ofthe long-run impacts of climate change," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 65147, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    4. Robert MacCulloch & Silvia Pezzini, 2010. "The Roles of Freedom, Growth, and Religion in the Taste for Revolution," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 53(2), pages 329-358, May.
    5. Timothy Besley & Torsten Persson, 2011. "Pillars of Prosperity: The Political Economics of Development Clusters," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 9624.
    6. Laura Recuero Virto & Denis Couvet & Frédéric Ducarme, 2018. "The determinants of economic growth in countries with high marine biodiversity," Working Papers 2018.03, FAERE - French Association of Environmental and Resource Economists.
    7. Hyungmin Park, 2024. "Theory of developmental dictatorship," Discussion Papers 2024-10, Nottingham Interdisciplinary Centre for Economic and Political Research (NICEP).
    8. Christopher Blattman & Edward Miguel, 2010. "Civil War," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(1), pages 3-57, March.
    9. Christopher Blattman, 2009. "Civil War: A Review of Fifty Years of Research," Working Papers id:2231, eSocialSciences.
    10. Alberto Abadie, 2006. "Poverty, Political Freedom, and the Roots of Terrorism," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(2), pages 50-56, May.
    11. Neryvia Pillay Bell, 2020. "Can unconditional cash transfers improve adolescent and young adult education outcomes?," Working Papers 207, Economic Research Southern Africa.
    12. Jong-A-Pin, Richard, 2009. "On the measurement of political instability and its impact on economic growth," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 15-29, March.
    13. Militiades N. Georgiou & Nicholas Kyriazis & Emmanouil M. L. Economou, 2015. "Democracy, Political Stability and Economic performance. A Panel Data Analysis," Journal of Risk & Control, Risk Market Journals, vol. 2(1), pages 1-18.
    14. Diaz-Bautista, Alejandro, 2002. "The role of telecommunications infrastructure and human capital: Mexico´s economic growth and convergence," ERSA conference papers ersa02p102, European Regional Science Association.
    15. Sunde, Uwe & Fortunato, Piergiuseppe & Cervellati, Matteo, 2011. "Democratization and Civil Liberties: The Role of Violence During the Transition," CEPR Discussion Papers 8315, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    16. Ghosal, Sayantan & Proto, Eugenio, 2009. "Democracy, collective action and intra-elite conflict," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(9-10), pages 1078-1089, October.
    17. Holger Strulik, 2008. "Social composition, social conflict and economic development," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 118(530), pages 1145-1170, July.
    18. Cervellati Matteo & Fortunato Piergiuseppe & Sunde Uwe, 2012. "Consensual and Conflictual Democratization," The B.E. Journal of Theoretical Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 12(1), pages 1-51, December.
    19. repec:dgr:rugsom:06c05 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Alberto Chong & Luisa Zanforlin, 2004. "Inward-Looking Policies, Institutions, Autocrats, and Economic Growth in Latin America: An Empirical Exploration," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 121(3), pages 335-361, February.
    21. Oded Galor, 2010. "The 2008 Lawrence R. Klein Lecture-Comparative Economic Development: Insights From Unified Growth Theory," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 51(1), pages 1-44, February.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Political cohesion; Economic growth;

    JEL classification:

    • O41 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - One, Two, and Multisector Growth Models
    • P16 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Capitalist Institutions; Welfare State

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hhs:gunwpe:0280. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Jessica Oscarsson (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/naiguse.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.