Now I try to approach the readings in an open minded way. I am but an undergrad and know that I have much to learn. Nevertheless this week’s reading “political competition and economic growth” irked me, stimulating a series of little rants that my poor partner had to weather – Golly that man has the patience of a saint! Anyway…
I can buy its basic argument. Leaders who rely on a large proportion of the population for support will adopt more publically minded policies thus increasing the general prosperity, than leaders who rely on a smaller group. This makes sense, as a leader you owe your guys. If you reward a small group of people, say 500, the larger population loses, while if you reward a large group, say 40% of total voters, the population as a whole is more likely to get some benefit. The upshot being democracy is better than autocracy.
The devil is however in the detail. The devil in this case being the assumptions made by the authors, who muddy their argument by equating neo-liberal policy with prosperity and democracy with all things good. (thanks Ben for your great Blog on Cuba!)
Below are my top 6 nitpicks.
1) Paragraph 1 Page 58
Political competition may “promote(s) economic growth and prosperity” when competition focuses on improving the welfare of citizens however by adding the further qualifier of “through the provision of market-enhancing public polices” the authors of the article abandon a true competition of ideas in preference for a narrower range consisting of neo liberal economic policies. This preference is not discussed as part of the paper.
2) Resource allocation page 61-63
The authors write that in a system of government where there is a large “winning coalition” the leader will allocate resources in a way that rewards its large number of supporters. This will result in money being spent on public goods rather than private goods, in other words water supply and policeman not Mercedes and fur coats. However are supporters equally valued and rewarded in a democracy? Does the executive reward equally the campaign funder and the factory worker, the swing vote and the sure bet? Cronyism and corruption are not incompatible with public spending.
There is also an assumption here that we all vote after a careful economic calculation, that issues such as abortion and gay marriage policy, or to bring it closer to home, nuclear and law enforcement policy, don’t motivate at least some of us.
3) Page 62
“He” does not mean person. Member is not a gender specific term. The authors published in 2001. There is no excuse.
4) Political Survival and Policy Performance 65-66
“It is natural to consider successful those leaders who foster economic growth for their citizens” The authors use a per capita comparison of autocratic v democratic income. A per capita figure will however mask the distribution of wealth and thus while showing us an increase in economic growth does not prove enhanced prosperity for all, or even a majority of citizens. (see again great blog on Cuba). However to be fair to the authors they do go on to mention a list of other indicators of prosperity…
5) Page 66
…this is the list:
Safe drinking water
Access to Medical care
Encouraging Free Trade
Avoiding Corruption
One of these kids just doesn’t belong here or, for those who did not have an 80’s childhood, there is an odd one out.
6) A tale of two Leopolds. Page 68-70
Leo would have had some ideological support for his different treatment of the two countries he led. He was a product of his time, may have read his Mill and decided that the Congo was not ready or suited for any form of representative government. Representative government was spreading in Europe at that time autocracy was the norm in Africa (someone correct me if I am way off the mark) While historical context does not justify his extreme exploitation as such abuses clearly were not acceptable to his society it does make the use of this case study a little questionable.
Now I don’t make these criticisms solely because I am a pedantic leftie with an axe to grind .There is a tendency for us all to sing the praises of democracy without a critical examination of the pros and cons of the system in action. Relative to an oppressive dictatatorship, democracy looks pretty good but are we referring to an idealized democracy? or a US conceived democracy? the US right? the US left? NZ’s particular version? We better be pretty comfortable with our prescription before we start forcing it onto other nations.
Wow Jean that is an awesome summary of the reading. There are many different styles of democracy e.g NZ, American, Australian and so the list goes on. There is no one "perfect" model of democracy and how we start getting the rest of the world apply it would be very difficult as it all really depends on the social/cultural, and economic situations.
ReplyDeleteNeo-liberal economics just like anything else has its pros and cons, in an ideal view of neo-liberalism we would like to think that the government of a free market economy will deliver what its supporters want in terms of public services, tax etc but we see those promises broken e.g National government breaking its promise on GST. but some promises are kept e.g tax cuts, which brings me on to another side of neo-liberal democracies. The citizens of a free market deomcracy tend to shoved down with big corporate fat cats having huge influence in the political system, such as the USA where both Republican and Democrats receive "Donations" during campaigns and if they get into government they will end up bowing down to their requests when it comes to drafting or ammending legislation. I think before we start "spreading the democracy gospel" around the world we need to consider other intangible things such as customs and cultures of other nations and see if it fits. The big democracies in the world are mainly neo-liberal, so what the authors were saying in my view is to spread free market neo -liberal economics/globalisation and then democracy will take place.
Jean and Tony, I don't think it follows from what the authors say that "we" need to spread anything. They are providing evidence that large coalition systems (not all of which may be democracies) tend to do better on a range of indicators. There may also be evidence to the contrary. Whether this means we need to be "promoting" anything is a different question.
ReplyDeleteA few points: the term "neoliberal" is being used too loosely here. The most successful democracies (e.g., the Nordic countries of Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Denmark; France; Germany; Japan) are large welfare states with universal programs (healthcare, etc.). The range of policies in big democracies is by no means uniform. The US is not the only democracy in the world, and it is in many ways quite different from other ones!
You point out that per capita income does not necessarily say much about distribution, which is true. But it is highly correlated with a number of other good things, so it makes sense as a kind of summary of these other good things (life expectancy, infant mortality, education, etc.). Clearly it is not everything, but it is not nothing either.
It should also be noted that the Cuban example is not as supportive of your points as it may seem. For example, equality in Cuba is not actually that great. There are huge differences between well-connected Cubans in the communist party hierarchy and your average Cuban. The successes of the Cuban health system, while real, are mostly in the past - Cuba punches above its weight for a country of its economic size, but lots of countries of similar income but democratic institutions do as well or better (e.g., Costa Rica: see this gapminder graph http://www.bit.ly/aCuHHC and find Cuba and Costa Rica. Then change the "welath" scale to a democracy scale and see how different they are, http://www.bit.ly/caC5Sb).
Thanks for your comments. You are right, the authors were not advocating the promotion of democracy but democracy promotion has been something that has been discussed on this blog. And yes Neo Liberal America (I use liberal as an economic descrption) is NOT the only type of democracy, this relates to my general gripe with the bias of this article which labels as general public goods things that I would term distict neo liberal preferences. Free trade does not belong in the same list as medical care and access to safe drinking water.
ReplyDeleteFinally, of course using a per capita figure for economic growth is indicative of many things but I think couching it in terms like the "democratic citizen" versus the "autocratic citizen" implies it describes the prosperity of the majority of citizens, something which may or may not be true. Thanks again for commenting on the blog in fact thanks for even reading to the end of it! Next time I'll give myself a word limit!