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Abstract of Job Market Paper: The Long-run Effects of Africa’s Wave of Democratization

I investigate the long-run effects of Africa’s 1990s democratization wave on economic performance and development. Using a dynamic panel fixed effects model, I first document a robust positive relationship between democratization and income per capita. I find that being in a democratic regime, as opposed to a nondemocratic one, is associated with a 1.2 % higher income per capita, while a full-range increase in the liberal democracy index from 0 to 1 raises income per capita by 13 %. To isolate the causal impact of democratization on long-run development, I exploit African borders that partition historically and culturally homogeneous ethnic groups into present-day consolidated democracies and nondemocracies. In this exercise, I first present grid cell-level panel fixed effects estimates showing a robust positive impact of democratization on subnational development, measured by nighttime light density. I then employ a within-ethnicity geographic regression discontinuity design to compute the development disparities across democratic and nondemocratic partitions over time. I find that democratic and nondemocratic partitions were initially at similar levels of development, but democratic partitions experienced sustained gains over time, leading to persistent divergence. By 2013, grid cells in democratic partitions were about 7 percentage points more likely to have light at night relative to their nondemocratic counterparts. Using individual-level survey data, I further show that democratization improves human development, particularly years of schooling, formal education access, and higher education completion, as well as other socioeconomic outcomes including economic security, employment, and access to public goods.

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