Economic Development, Democratic Experience, and Political Parties' Linkage Strategies. (November 2013)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Kitschelt, Herbert; Kselman, Daniel M.
• Editors: Lupu, Noam; Riedl, Rachel Beatty
• Is Part Of: Comparative political studies. Volume 46:Number 11(2013)
• Page Start: 1453
• Page End: 1484
• Publication Date: 2013-11
• Subjects: clientelism -- programmatism -- party organization -- development -- democratic experience; Political science -- Periodicals; 320.05
• DOI: 10.1177/0010414012453450
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0010-4140

Abstract

This article examines the relationship among a country's democratic experience, its level of economic development, and the prevalence of clientelistic and programmatic modes of democratic accountability. In contrast to the commonly accepted wisdom that clientelistic politics will decrease monotonically as a country's economy develops and its democracy consolidates, the authors argue theoretically and demonstrate empirically that clientelism tends in fact to increase as a country moves from low to intermediate levels of democracy and development. They also uncover preliminary evidence that a history of regime instability may have independent consequences on the prevalence of one or the other linkage mechanism. Finally, the results suggest that a country's level of economic development and exposure to the international economy are more consistent predictors of programmatic effort and coherence than are measures of a country's regime type.