Democracy and the Poor

• In Event: Deepening Global Health Politics: Policies, Agendas, and Democratic Complexity

Abstract

Conventional wisdom suggests that democracy improves the welfare of the poor. However, the literature investigating the impact of democracy has been filled with contradictory findings (Acemoglu et al, 2013). Certain studies, using country-level data on infant mortality, claim that democracy improves rates of survival (McGuire 2010), while others show no effect (Ross 2006). Country level data however, are subject to confounding factors. For this reason, Kudamatsu (2012) uses micro-level data to compare the survival of infants born to the same mother before and after democratization and shows that democracy does in fact improve infant survival.

Left unknown however, is how these improvements are distributed by income group and biodemographic status. Does democracy improve infant survival rates more amongst the poor? We investigate this question by comparing the survival rate of twins vis-à-vis singletons. Twins are typically born with lower birth weight and scarcer parental resources (due to competition). We therefore use the survival rates of twins as a proxy for groups with limited access to resources. Drawing upon more than 4 million observations from 40 sub-Saharan African countries, we use difference-in-differences analysis and regression discontinuity design to investigate the impact of democracy on twins’ survival rates. Preliminary findings suggest that democracy improves infant survival rates – and that democracy’s effect is greater for twins. This suggests that that democracy’s benefits disproportionately accrue to those with limited access to resources.

The contributions of this paper are two-fold. Methodologically, it introduces a novel way of measuring the poor and improves on identification as twin status is more exogenous than parental income. In addition, it contributes to the debate on the impact of democracy on the welfare of the poor.

Authors

• Carmen Jacqueline Ho, University of Guelph

• Marie Christelle Mabeu

• Roland Pongou, University Of Ottawa