Introduction to Comparative Politics (POLI SCI 120)

Midterm #2 Terms to Study

The Grocer and the Chief

A thought experiment (from Lerner) contrasting a traditional chief who cannot imagine being someone else with a modern grocer who can. It illustrates the ‘empathic capacity’ required for modernization, the psychological shift towards imagining alternative identities and roles.

Chief = fixed identity; Grocer = mobile, modern identity

Modernization and Development

The theory that societies progress through a set sequence of stages, from tradition to modern, as economies industrialize, urbanize, and secularize. Associated with Rosow’s stages of growth and the idea that all societies follow a similar trajectory.

Assumes convergence towards Western-style modernity.

Criticized for Eurocentrism and ignoring colonial context

Development as Freedom

Amartya Sen’s framework argues that development should be understood as the expansion of substantive freedoms and capabilities that people should have reason to value, not just income growth. Poverty is deprivation of capability; development removes ‘unfreedoms.’

Freedom as both means and end of development:

Political freedom, economic opportunity, social safety nets, transparency, and security.

Example: A woman who cannot leave her house due to social norms is ‘unfree’ regardless of GDP.

GDP per Capita

Gross Domestic Product divided by the Population: the most common measure of average economic output per person in a country. Often used as a proxy for living standards, though it ignores distribution, inequality, and non-market welfare.

Key Points:

• Standard measure of average income/output

• Ignores inequality: a few billionaires can raise it

• Doesn’t capture health, education, political freedom

Human Development Index (HDI)

A composite index developed by the UNDP combining life expectancy, education (mean and expected years of schooling), and GNI per capita. Broader than GDP alone, reflecting Sen’s capabilities approach.

Key Points:

• Three dimensions: health, education, income

• Ranges 0-1; above 0.8 = very high development

• Better captures well-being but still imperfect (ignores inequality, environment)

Proximate vs. Deep Causes for Growth

Proximate causes are the immediate inputs driving growth (capital, labor, technology, and education). Deep causes explain why those inputs differ across countries, typically institutions, geography, or culture. Acemoglu et al. emphasize deep causes.

Key Points:

• Proximate: capital, labor, technology

• Deep: institutions, geography, culture, history

• Policy must target deep causes to achieve lasting change

The Solow Growth Model

A neoclassical model where long-run GDP per capita is determined by the savings rate, population growth, and exogenous technological progress. Capital accumulation alone cannot sustain growth due to diminishing returns; technology is the only permanent driver.

Key Points:

• Y = f(K,L) with diminishing returns to K

• Steady Rate: investment = depreciation

• Technology (A) drives long-run growth; savings only affect levels

Example: A country with a higher savings rate reachers high steady-state income but the same growth rate.

Capital Fundamentalism

The belief (dominant in early development economics, e.g., World Bank in 1950s-60s) that lack of physical capital is the primary constraint on development, and that injecting, via aid or loans, will trigger take-off growth.

Key Points:

• Basis for early foreign aid strategies

• Critiqued: ignores institutions, huan capital, incentive structures

• Harrod-Domar model undelies this view

Diminishing returns to capital

As more capital is added (holding other factors constant), each additional unit of capital produces less additional output. A core feature of the Solow model that predicts convergence, poor countries should grow faster than rich ones.

Key Points:

• Marginal product of capital declines as K rises

• Poor countries have low K —> high MPK —> faster growth

• Convergeance prediction: poor countries catch up to rich

Example: First tractor on a farm huge gain; 100th tractor adds little.

Convergance (and its failure)

Conditional convergence: countries with similar institutions/policies will converge in income over time (consistent with Solow). Unconditional convergence has largely failed: poor countries do not automatically catch up. Divergence is observed when institutions differ.

Key Points:

• Absolute convergence: poor always grow faster (rejected empirically)

• Conditional convergence: true if controlling for steady state

• Club convergence: countries converge within similar institutional groups

The Harrod-Domar Model

An early growth model arguing that growth is a function of the savings rate divided by the capital-output ratio (g=s/v). Implies that injecting savings (via aid) directly generates growth, the basis for capital fundamentalism. Criticized for ignoring incentive problems.

Key Points:

• g = g/v (growth = savings rate/ capital-ouput ratio)

• Implies linear relationship between aid and growth

• No role for instituions, efficiency, or incentives

Institutions (North’s Definition)

North defines institutions as ‘the rules of the game in a society’: formal rules (laws, constitutions), informal constraints (norms, conventions), and their environment. They shape incentives and determine economic outcomes.

Key Points:

• Rules of the game: formal + informal

• Reduce uncertainty and transaction costs

• Persist over time even when suboptimal (path dependence)

• Example: Property rights laws (forma); norms of trust (informal)

Inclusive vs. Extractive Institutions

From Acemoglu and Robinson’s ‘Why Nations Fail.’ Inclusive institutions distribute power broadly, protect property rights, and allow creative destruction. Extractive institutions concentrate power and resources among elites, blocking broad prosperity.

Key Points:

• Inclusive: pluralistic political power + broad economic participation

• Extractive elite capture of politics and economics

• Virtuous cycle (inclusive —> growth) vs. vicious cycle (extractive —> stagnation)

Example: Botswana (inclusive) vs. Zimbabwe (extractive) after independence

The Fundamental Problem of Political Economy

Those in power have both the motive and the means to design institutions that serve their interest rather than the common good. Efficient institutions may not emerge because they threaten the political power of elites, the ‘commitment problem.’

Key Points:

• Power —> self-serving institutions

• Efficient does not equal financially stable

• Explains why bad institutions persist even when reform is possible

Credible Commitment

The Glorious Revolution

Path Dependence

Colonial origins of governemnt

The reversal of fortune

Social trust

The Protestant Work Ethic

The ultimatum game

Imagined communities

Print capitalism

The invention of tradition

Gellner’s theory of nationalism

Primordialist vs. constructivist views of identity

The colonial construction of ethnic categories

Ethnicity and resource competition

Minimum winning coalitions

Cross-cutting vs. reinforcing cleavages

Religion as a unique identity

The secularization hypothesis

The political economy model of religion (supply side)

Diversity and violence

Greed versus grievance in civil wars

The electoral incentives for violence

Climate change and the tragedy of the commons

Concentrated losers versus diffuse winners

Climate change and veto points