IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/adl/wpaper/2011-05.html

Economic Growth and the Rise of Political Extremism

Author

Listed:
  • Markus Bruckner

    (School of Economics, University of Adelaide)

  • Hans Peter Gruner

    (University of Mannheim and CEPR)

Abstract

In many western democracies, political parties with extreme platforms challenge more moderate incumbents. This paper analyses the impact of economic growth on the support for extreme political platforms. We provide a theoretical argument in favor of growth effects (as opposed to level effects) on the support for extreme political parties and we empirically investigate the relationship between growth and extremist votes. Lower growth rates benefit right-wing and nationalist parties, but do not have a robust positive effect on the support for communist parties. Our estimates indicate that extreme political platforms are unlikely to gain majorities in OECD countries, unless there is an extreme drop in the GDP per capita growth rate.

Suggested Citation

  • Markus Bruckner & Hans Peter Gruner, 2011. "Economic Growth and the Rise of Political Extremism," School of Economics and Public Policy Working Papers 2011-05, University of Adelaide, School of Economics and Public Policy.
    • Handle: RePEc:adl:wpaper:2011-05
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://media.adelaide.edu.au/economics/papers/doc/wp2011-05.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Markus Brückner & Antonio Ciccone, 2011. "Rain and the Democratic Window of Opportunity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(3), pages 923-947, May.
    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. Wilde, Joshua & Apouey, Bénédicte H. & Jung, Toni, 2017. "The effect of ambient temperature shocks during conception and early pregnancy on later life outcomes," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 87-107.
    2. Patrick Lehnert & Michael Niederberger & Uschi Backes-Gellner & Eric Bettinger, 2020. "Proxying Economic Activity with Daytime Satellite Imagery: Filling Data Gaps Across Time and Space," Economics of Education Working Paper Series 0165, University of Zurich, Department of Business Administration (IBW), revised Sep 2022.
    3. Gründler, Klaus & Krieger, Tommy, 2022. "Should we care (more) about data aggregation?," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 142(C).
    4. Askarov, Zohid & Doucouliagos, Hristos, 2015. "Spatial aid spillovers during transition," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 40(PA), pages 79-95.
    5. Kien Le & My Nguyen, 2022. "The impacts of rainfall shocks on birth weight in Vietnam," Journal of Development Effectiveness, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 14(2), pages 143-159, April.
    6. Austin L. Wright, 2016. "Economic Shocks and Rebel," HiCN Working Papers 232, Households in Conflict Network.
    7. Ishak, Phoebe W., 2021. "Murder nature weather and violent crime in Brazil," Discussion Papers 2021/2, Free University Berlin, School of Business & Economics.
    8. Dorsch, Michael T. & Maarek, Paul, 2020. "Economic downturns, inequality, and democratic improvements," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    9. Beni Kouevi-Gath & Pierre-Guillaume Méon & Laurent Weill, 2021. "Do banking crises improve democracy?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 186(3), pages 413-446, March.
    10. Flückiger, Matthias & Ludwig, Markus, 2015. "Economic shocks in the fisheries sector and maritime piracy," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 107-125.
    11. Rashad Hasanov & Prasad Sankar Bhattacharya, 2023. "Political regimes and financial crises," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 70(4), pages 285-318, September.
    12. Marco Manacorda & Andrea Tesei, 2020. "Liberation Technology: Mobile Phones and Political Mobilization in Africa," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 88(2), pages 533-567, March.
    13. Yuriy Gorodnichenko & Gerard Roland, 2021. "Culture, institutions and democratization," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 187(1), pages 165-195, April.
    14. Lachaud, Michee Arnold & Bravo-Ureta, Boris E. & Ludena, Carlos E., 2015. "Agricultural productivity growth in Latin America and the Caribbean and other world regions: An analysis of climatic effects, convergence and catch-up," Working Papers 40, University of Connecticut, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Charles J. Zwick Center for Food and Resource Policy.
    15. Calderon,Cesar & Nguyen,Ha Minh, 2015. "Do capital inflows boost growth in developing countries ? evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa," Policy Research Working Paper Series 7298, The World Bank.
    16. Papaioannou, Elias & Siourounis, Gregorios, 2008. "Economic and social factors driving the third wave of democratization," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(3), pages 365-387, September.
    17. Docquier, Frédéric & Lodigiani, Elisabetta & Rapoport, Hillel & Schiff, Maurice, 2016. "Emigration and democracy," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 209-223.
    18. Popova, Olga & Otrachshenko, Vladimir & Tavares, José, 2019. "Extreme Temperature and Extreme Violence across Age and Gender: Evidence from Russia," GLO Discussion Paper Series 382, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    19. Danne, Christian, 2009. "Commitment devices, opportunity windows, and institution building in Central Asia," MPRA Paper 16597, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • O40 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - General
    • O52 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Europe
    • P16 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Capitalist Institutions; Welfare State

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:adl:wpaper:2011-05. 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: Qazi Haque (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/decadau.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.