Political competition and economic performance: empirical evidence from Pakistan

The influence of politics on economic policy is not fully understood. The challenge to ensure political inclusiveness and economic prosperity remains. Perhaps, one way to attain this objective is by increasing political competition. This paper gathers empirical evidence from Pakistan, a country with a checkered political history characterized by episodes of representative, non-representative, and indirectly elected governments. In recent years, the country has witnessed a gradual strengthening of democratic rule with economic progress. Focusing on nine elections held over 1970 to 2015 the authors measure political competition and estimate its impact on economic performance. Contrary to popular conceptions about Pakistan’s economic performance, they find a positive association between lack of political competition and poor economic performance. This finding holds at national as well as subnational levels in Pakistan and withstands a number of robustness tests.

政治对经济政策的影响机制尚未被完全厘清。保障政治包容性与经济繁荣的挑战依然存在。或许，提升政治竞争程度是实现该目标的一条可行路径。本文收集了来自巴基斯坦的经验证据——该国政治历程跌宕起伏，先后经历过代议制政府、非代议制政府以及间接选举产生的政府等多个阶段。近年来，该国民主治理逐步完善，同时实现了经济发展。作者以1970年至2015年间举行的九次选举为研究样本，量化了政治竞争程度，并评估了其对经济表现的影响。与针对巴基斯坦经济表现的主流观点不同，研究团队发现政治竞争不足与经济表现不佳之间存在显著正相关关系。该研究结论在巴基斯坦全国及地方各级层面均成立，且通过了多项稳健性检验。