Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/80614 
Year of Publication: 
2013
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 7441
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
We develop a theory of endogenous regimes transitions (with a focus on democratic consolidation), which emphasizes the role of political culture and of its interaction with political institutions. Political culture reflects the extent of individual commitment across citizens to defend democracy against a potential military coup, and it is an endogenous state variable of the model along with formal political institutions. We focus on two agencies of political socialization: the family and the state. Parents invest resources in order to transmit their own political values (commitment to democracy) to their children. The state invests resources in public indoctrination infrastructures. The model displays two-way complementarities between political regimes and political culture diffusion. Consolidated democracy emerges when sufficiently many people are committed to democracy. Otherwise the model features persistent fluctuations in and out of democracy as well as cycles of political culture. Importantly, the politico-economic equilibrium may exhibit a persistent (although declining) incongruence between political institutions and political culture, which tends to evolve more slowly than formal institutions.
Subjects: 
political culture
socialization
democracy
military
nondemocracy
political economy
political transitions
institutional consolidation
path dependency
JEL: 
P16
H11
H26
H41
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size
697.45 kB





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.