Partisan external borrowing in middle-income countries

Ben Cormier

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: Why do middle-income country governments use costlier sovereign debt markets when cheaper finance is available from official creditors? This research note argues that left-leaning governments with labor and the poor as core constituencies are likely to prioritize markets in their annual foreign borrowings. This is because markets provide an exit option from official creditor conditions that have disproportionately negative effects on working classes. This finding puts limits on disciplinary assumptions that left-leaning governments should have relatively less access to sovereign debt markets and thus use them less. Instead, left-leaning middle-income countries are likely to use proportionally more market finance as they fulfill annual foreign borrowing needs. This, in turn, shapes which middle-income countries are likely to become relatively more exposed to global debt market costs and pressures as they accumulate external debt over time.

Keywords: borrower autonomy; external borrowing; partisanship; public debt accumulation; sovereign debt (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E6 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 11 pages
Date: 2022-02-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-fdg, nep-isf and nep-mac
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Published in British Journal of Political Science, 7, February, 2022, pp. 1-11. ISSN: 0007-1234

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:113929

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