The few autocratic states that are developing ought to turn democratic.
Murang'a County has very intellectually gifted members of the county assembly. They recently engaged me in a most intense intellectual discourse.
Between benevolent dictatorship and democracy, which gives nations better economic outcomes?
They argued for a benevolent dictatorship. They cited Rwanda and China as countries that recently have achieved good economic progress under benevolent dictatorship.
They did not rule out democracy completely but they argued: “it comes after a country achieves a certain level of development”. But not at the beginning.
“Even the so-called advanced societies in Europe were benevolent autocracies at the beginning living under autocratic monarchs. That was important to plant the seed of democracy with a single-minded focus. They changed course after reaching a certain threshold of development,” they argued.
To them, democracy at the beginning is expensive. It causes slow implementation of projects through tiresome litigations and endless consultations.
They cited South Africa as an example of a country that seems to be in regression after democracy was ushered in.
Slower pace
Their key argument was that whereas democratic countries can grow their economies, they do so at a slower pace albeit due to the many consultations needed plus litigations.
Probably they could have cited many more benevolent dictatorships that planted developmental seeds in their countries. Taiwan had to undergo White Terror of KMT party in the 1960s to grow. Syngman Rhee and Park Chung He in the 1950s and 60s oppressed South Korea, but it grew.
Pinochet did the same to Chile after toppling a socialist government in the 1970s and turning the country into an economic miracle in South America. Franco ruled for 40 years in Spain but helped the country to prosper. Or Arab states of Qatar or UAE or even Libya.
But I disagreed. I held the view that for every benevolent dictatorship that helps development, there is an equal or higher number of dictatorships that made their countries worse. Idi Amin of Uganda, Mobutu of Zaire, Khamer Rouge of Cambodia, Moi of Kenya and North Korea regime of Kim dynasty. And there are many examples of developmental democracies. Botswana and Seychelles have achieved fast and good development notwithstanding long years of democracy.
What about democratic Guyana — the fastest-growing country in the world?
Or even India which is growing at 7 per cent per annum?
Some might argue Modi of India is not a true democrat hence the theory of benevolent dictatorships might be confirmed by his leadership style.
Well, this is a deep debate. Probable readers are encouraged to read books by 2024 Winners of Nobel prize for Economics - James A. Robinson, Simon Johnson and Daren Acemoglu. Their works demonstrate the link between countries’ institutions and prosperity. According to them, the differences in nations’ prosperity depend on the decision to establish( or not) inclusive economic and political institutions.
Among their most important books include “Why Nations Fail” (2012) and “Narrow Corridor” (2019).
Inclusive political institutions mean democratic states which enable resources to reach a wider population and decisions to be made with the majority in mind.
Extractive political institutions mean autocratic forms of government where decisions are made by unelected elites.
Inclusive economic institutions basically mean free market institutions that protect property and innovation. These writers agree there are instances when autocratic countries can establish inclusive economic institutions and growth occurs. But that does not last long and they give several examples of such countries. For example, the Soviet Union grew fast in 1940's but regressed later.
Autocracies have other flaws compared to democracies. Inherently they assume the leader is right in regard to any decision — which is an error. Thus autocracies miss the benefits of the wisdom of the crowd — the idea that a group of diverse and independent individuals make better decisions than single persons. The wisdom of the crowd enables errors (of biases for instance) to cancel each other. Diversity brings angles to a discussion.
Autocracies stifle competition of ideas. That which appears like stifling noise in a democracy is in an actual sense healthy competition where ideas compete in the “market of ideas”. Autocracies are like economic monopolies. Assume you go to a country where the supply of motor vehicle oil is monopolised by one company. Would that be a marker of progress? No.
Probably the oil would be overpriced. The oil firm’s officials would lack incentives to provide customers care as there is no competition.
The same logic applies in politics. Autocracies might appear good on the face of it. But they lack competition and chances of sleeping on the job are high for lack of innovations to stay ahead of the game.
If indeed democracy and inclusive political institutions are the key to progress, how come all countries do not make that obvious choice?
That is a political choice of any country’s elite.
Often, the elite make such choices through political pressure by the people.
In a few instances, the enlightened elite nudge their societies towards the adoption of inclusive economic and political institutions.
Therefore, the few autocratic states that are developing ought to turn democratic.
Otherwise, they can reverse that trajectory.
A good example is Libya. Its inclusive economic institutions did not last past Gaddafi’s lifetime.
Dr Kang’ata is the Governor of Muranga County. [email protected].
