TY  - JOUR
AU  - Murtin,Fabrice
AU  - Wacziarg,Romain
TI  - The Democratic Transition
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 17432
PY  - 2011
Y2  - September 2011
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w17432
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w17432.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Fabrice Murtin
Organisation for Economic
  Co-operation and Development
2 rue Andre Pascal
75016 Paris, France
E-Mail: fabrice.murtin@oecd.org

Romain Wacziarg
Anderson School of Management at UCLA
C-510 Entrepreneurs Hall
110 Westwood Plaza
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1481
Tel: 310 825 4507
E-Mail: wacziarg@ucla.edu
AB  - Over the last two centuries, many countries experienced regime transitions toward democracy. We document this democratic transition over a long time horizon. We use historical time series of income, education and democracy levels from 1870 to 2000 to explore the economic factors associated with rising levels of democracy. We find that primary schooling, and to a weaker extent per capita income levels, are strong determinants of the quality of political institutions. We find little evidence of causality running the other way, from democracy to income or education.
ER  -