IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wbk/wbrwps/3630.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Governance matters IV : governance indicators for 1996-2004

Author

Listed:
  • Kaufmann, Daniel
  • Kraay, Aart
  • Mastruzzi, Massimo

Abstract

The authors present the latest update of their aggregate governance indicators, together with new analysis of several issues related to the use of these measures. The governance indicators measure the following six dimensions of governance: (1) voice and accountability; (2) political instability and violence; (3) government effectiveness; (4) regulatory quality; (5) rule of law, and (6) control of corruption. They cover 209 countries and territories for 1996, 1998, 2000, 2002, and 2004. They are based on several hundred individual variables measuring perceptions of governance, drawn from 37 separate data sources constructed by 31 organizations. The authors present estimates of the six dimensions of governance for each period, as well as margins of error capturing the range of likely values for each country. These margins of error are not unique to perceptions-based measures of governance, but are an important feature of all efforts to measure governance, including objective indicators. In fact, the authors give examples of how individual objective measures provide an incomplete picture of even the quite particular dimensions of governance that they are intended to measure. The authors also analyze in detail changes over time in their estimates of governance; provide a framework for assessing the statistical significance of changes in governance; and suggest a simple rule of thumb for identifying statistically significant changes in country governance over time. The ability to identify significant changes in governance over time is much higher for aggregate indicators than for any individual indicator. While the authors find that the quality of governance in a number of countries has changed significantly (in both directions), they also provide evidence suggesting that there are no trends, for better or worse, in global averages of governance. Finally, they interpret the strong observed correlation between income and governance, and argue against recent efforts to apply a discount to governance performance in low-income countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Kaufmann, Daniel & Kraay, Aart & Mastruzzi, Massimo, 2005. "Governance matters IV : governance indicators for 1996-2004," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3630, The World Bank.
  • Handle: RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:3630
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2005/06/15/000016406_20050615140310/Rendered/PDF/wps3630.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hellman, Joel S. & Jones, Geraint & Kaufmann, Daniel & Schankerman, Mark, 2000. "Measuring governance, corruption, and State capture - how firms and bureaucrats shape the business environment in transition economies," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2312, The World Bank.
    2. Francisco Alcalá & Antonio Ciccone, 2004. "Trade and Productivity," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 119(2), pages 613-646.
    3. Daron Acemoglu & Simon Johnson & James A. Robinson, 2001. "The Colonial Origins of Comparative Development: An Empirical Investigation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(5), pages 1369-1401, December.
    4. Dani Rodrik & Arvind Subramanian & Francesco Trebbi, 2004. "Institutions Rule: The Primacy of Institutions Over Geography and Integration in Economic Development," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 9(2), pages 131-165, June.
    5. Roberto Rigobon & Dani Rodrik, 2004. "Rule of Law, Democracy, Openness, and Income: Estimating the Interrelationships," NBER Working Papers 10750, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Robert E. Hall & Charles I. Jones, 1999. "Why do Some Countries Produce So Much More Output Per Worker than Others?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 114(1), pages 83-116.
    7. Kaufmann, Daniel & Kraay, Aart & Zoido-Lobaton, Pablo, 1999. "Aggregating governance indicators," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2195, The World Bank.
    8. Edward L. Glaeser & Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes & Andrei Shleifer, 2004. "Do Institutions Cause Growth?," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 9(3), pages 271-303, September.
    9. Goldberger, Arthur S, 1972. "Maximum-Likelihood Estimation of Regressions Containing Unobservable Independent Variables," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 13(1), pages 1-15, February.
    10. Author-Name: Jeffrey D. Sachs & John W. McArthur & Guido Schmidt-Traub & Margaret Kruk & Chandrika Bahadur & Michael Faye & Gordon McCord, 2004. "Ending Africa's Poverty Trap," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 35(1), pages 117-240.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Daniel Kaufmann & Aart Kraay & Massimo Mastruzzi, 2006. "Measuring Governance Using Cross-Country Perceptions Data," Chapters, in: Susan Rose-Ackerman (ed.), International Handbook on the Economics of Corruption, chapter 2, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Sambit Bhattacharyya, 2011. "Growth Miracles and Growth Debacles," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 13609.
    3. Badinger, Harald, 2008. "Trade policy and productivity," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 52(5), pages 867-891, July.
    4. Enrico Spolaore & Romain Wacziarg, 2009. "The Diffusion of Development," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 124(2), pages 469-529.
    5. Rabah Arezki & Frederick van der Ploeg, 2011. "Do Natural Resources Depress Income Per Capita?," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 15(3), pages 504-521, August.
    6. Casey, Gregory & Klemp, Marc, 2021. "Historical instruments and contemporary endogenous regressors," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 149(C).
    7. Dawood Mamoon & S. Mansoob Murshed, 2009. "Want economic growth with good quality institutions? Spend on education," Education Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 17(4), pages 445-468.
    8. Stimpfle, Alexander & Stadelmann, David, 2015. "The Impact of Fundamental Development Factors on Different Income Groups: International Evidence," VfS Annual Conference 2015 (Muenster): Economic Development - Theory and Policy 113128, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    9. Sambit Bhattacharyya & Steve Dowrick & Jane Golley, 2009. "Institutions and Trade: Competitors or Complements in Economic Development?," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 85(270), pages 318-330, September.
    10. Rabah Arezki & Frederick van der Ploeg, 2007. "Can the Natural Resource Curse Be Turned into a Blessing? The Role of Trade Policies and Institutions," Economics Working Papers ECO2007/35, European University Institute.
    11. Costantini, Valeria & Liberati, Paolo, 2014. "Technology transfer, institutions and development," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 26-48.
    12. Rohini Pande & Christopher Udry, 2005. "Institutions and Development:A View from Below," Working Papers 928, Economic Growth Center, Yale University.
    13. Uwe Sunde, 2006. "Wirtschaftliche Entwicklung und Demokratie – Ist Demokratie ein Wohlstandsmotor oder ein Wohlstandsprodukt?," Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 7(4), pages 471-499, November.
    14. Alali, Walid Y., 2010. "Impact of Institutions and Policy on Economic Growth: Empirical Evidence," EconStor Preprints 269878, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    15. Karam, Fida & Zaki, Chahir, 2019. "Why Don’t MENA Countries Trade More? The Curse of Deficient Institutions," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 56-77.
    16. Alexandre Dmitriev, 2013. "Institutions and growth: evidence from estimation methods robust to weak instruments," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(13), pages 1625-1635, May.
    17. Malik, Adeel & Temple, Jonathan R.W., 2009. "The geography of output volatility," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(2), pages 163-178, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:3630. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Roula I. Yazigi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dvewbus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.