Democratic Deficiencies: Institutions, Development, and Water Access

• In Event: Democratic Politics, Development, and the Environment

Abstract

Democracies are commonly thought to provide greater levels of public goods than autocracies (e.g., Bueno de Mesquita et al., 2003; Lake and Baum, 2001; Przeworksi et al., 2000). Given that many public goods are provided locally, higher levels of local democracy are further thought to result in better rates of provision in both autocratic and democratic systems (e.g., Díaz-Cayeros et al., 2014; Zhang et al., 2002). However, more recent studies have cast doubt on democratic superiority in public goods provision both nationally and locally (Bardhan and Mookherjee, 2005; Gottlieb 2010; Ross, 2006; Tsai, 2007; Wang and Yao, 2006). Spurred by the recent adoption of a human right to water, we re-examine these contested relationships to investigate a baseline measure of public goods: improved water access. Investigating the effects of national and local democracy in conjunction with economic development, we examine a global sample of states from 2000-2015 and arrive at four findings: 1) Basic water varies little by national regime type when accounting for development; 2) Local democracy has a positive effect on water access in poor states; 3) The positive effect of local democracy on water access declines as wealth increases; and 4) Compliance with the human right to water reveals that the extant human rights literature has obscured trends related to regime type by largely focusing on physical integrity violations. The results of this study suggest three paths forward. First, more nuance is needed in the study of public goods provision beyond regime resources or a theoretical rationale for increased provision related to national regime characteristics. Second, considering the conditional influences of local institutional characteristics, development metrics help to illustrate the complicated circumstances determining access to basic public goods. Third, the inclusion of alternative measures of human rights compliance can help to illustrate democratic deficiencies in the area.

Authors

• Rebecca Eileen Schiel

• Bruce M. Wilson, University of Central Florida

• Malcolm Langford, University of Oslo