Extreme bounds of democracy

Whatdetermines theemergence and survival of democracy?The authors apply extreme bounds analysis to test the robustness of fifty-nine factors proposed in the literature, evaluating over three million regressions with data from 165 countries from 1976 to 2002. Themost robust determinants of the transition to democracy are gross domestic product (GDP) growth (a negative effect), past transitions (a positive effect), and Orga-nisation for Economic Co-operation and Development membership (a positive effect). There is some evidence that fuel exporters and Muslim countries are less likely to see democracy emerge, although the latter finding is driven entirely by oil-producingMuslim countries. Regarding the survival of democracy, themost robust determinants areGDP per capita (a positive effect) and past transitions (a negative effect). There is some evi-dence that having a former military leader as the chief executive has a negative effect, while having other democracies as neighbors has a reinforcing effect. Keywords Democracy, dictatorship, transitions, political regime Stories of democracy abound—and with good reason. Democracy has emerged under all sorts of conditions, and it is puzzling why different political regimes sur-vive in some countries but not others. Some argue that regime depends on a country’s inherent culture, others argue that culture is malleable and diffuses acros