Democracy and Growth: Evidence of a New Measurement

Klaus Gründler () and Tommy Krieger

No 5647, CESifo Working Paper Series from CESifo

Abstract: We present a novel approach for measuring democracy based on Support Vector Machines, a mathematical algorithm for pattern recognition. The Support Vector Machines Democracy Index (SVMDI) is continuously on the 0-1-interval and enables a very detailed measurement of democracy for 188 countries between 1981 and 2011. Application of the SVMDI highlights a robust positive relationship between democracy and economic growth. We argue that the ambiguity in recent studies mainly originates from the lack of sensitivity of traditional democracy indicators. Analyzing transmission channels we conclude that democratic countries have better educated populations, higher investment shares, and lower fertility rates, but not necessarily higher levels of redistribution.

Keywords: democracy; economic growth; democracy index; support vector machines (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C43 F50 F55 H00 O11 P48 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.cesifo.org/DocDL/cesifo1_wp5647.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Democracy and Growth: Evidence of a new measurement (2016)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ces:ceswps:_5647

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CESifo Working Paper Series from CESifo Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Klaus Wohlrabe ().