The empirical literature on the relationship between democracy and growth has yielded conflicting results. Cross …-country studies have failed to identify a significant impact of democracy on growth, while within-country studies have found a strong … positive effect of the transition to democracy on growth. We reconcile the conflicting evidence by showing that the positive …

, depending on whether it appears in the form of rises in income or in education: A higher income level reduces democracy, whereas … more education leads to both more democracy and more repression. These theoretical findings are corroborated by panel data …

democracy on economic growth. The aggregate growth of the economy under autocracy remained better as compared to democratic …