International Trade And Democracy: How Trade Partners Affect Regime Change And Persistence

41 Pages Posted: 26 Oct 2020

See all articles by Pavel Pronin

Pavel Pronin

National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow); National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow) - Institute for Industrial and Market Studies

Date Written: October 23, 2020

Abstract

This paper explores how international trade flows contribute to democracy and shows that countries' trade partners define the nature of this relationship: higher volumes of trade with democracies are conducive to democracy, while higher trade levels with autocracies undermine it. Moreover, the effects of trade are uneven and are pronounced only for 49 states (34% of the sample). Results also indicate that trade with democracies does not sufficiently influence democratic transitions but rather helps already established democracies to endure. The "autocratic trade", on the opposite, undermines democratic survival, and it also reduces the probability of transition from partial democracies. Therefore, trade only partially supports democratic promotion when it is, indeed, a source of authoritarian promotion and consolidation. These findings are robust to accounting for autocorrelation, checking sensitivity of model specifications and acknowledging that democracy is measured with error. Finally, Instrumental Variable estimation, using predicted trade volumes from the Gravity Equation, shows that these effects are also causal.

Keywords: Democracy, Regime Transitions, International Trade, Economic Globalization, Bayesian Modeling

JEL Classification: D72, F68

Suggested Citation

Pronin, Pavel and Pronin, Pavel, International Trade And Democracy: How Trade Partners Affect Regime Change And Persistence (October 23, 2020). Higher School of Economics Research Paper No. WP BRP 75/PS/2020, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3717614 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3717614

Pavel Pronin (Contact Author)

National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow) - Institute for Industrial and Market Studies ( email )

Myasnitskaya 20
Moscow, 101000
Russia

National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow) ( email )

Myasnitskaya street, 20
Moscow, Moscow 119017
Russia

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