This happened in 2020: the U.S. economy contracted by 3.5% and China’s expanded by 2.3%; and Covid deaths, per million of population, were 300x higher in the U.S. than in China. There’s no debate to be had therefore about which country handled the problem better. Advantage, China.
In the paper highlighted today from Yusuke Narita and Ayumi Sudo, both from Yale University, the researchers wanted to see if the U.S.-China comparison could be extended by looking at other democracies and autocracies around the world? Here’s what they found “..stronger democracies cause[d] greater GDP declines and higher Covid-19 mortality during 2020.”
What is it about democracies that caused them (mostly) to fluff up so badly? The answer seems, in nearly all cases, to have been speed of initial response. Once in-gear they did a good job but it’s the getting-into-gear that seems to have been responsible for most of the problems.
The researchers wondered if results would differ if they removed the two elephants in the room, China and the U.S., but they didn’t. It really was a consistent failing by democracies.
So, Democracy bad, autocracy good? Only the most simple minded partisan would draw that inference in a wider context and the researchers, being neither, conclude sensibly as follows: “Our preferred interpretation of our findings is that there may be room for improvement in particular aspects of democracy in particular situations, so that governments can decisively and thoroughly take potentially unpopular, yet effective actions in the middle of an emergency like a pandemic.” Quite.
I doubt we’ve heard the last of this kind of analysis given the heterogeneity of country outcomes to Covid both in 2020 and beyond so brace for more work in a similar vein. I expect little though will be couched in such cool and fair-minded terms as the report here. [Which makes it especially worth a longer squint if you have the time.]
I’d like to throw in my two pennyworth before signing off. Democracies may have done badly with Covid but they’ll learn from their experiences, discuss, analyze, raise public debate and ultimately perfect systems in response.
Autocracies, now busy spraining arms with self-back-pats, may not feel the need for similar introspection; and there, in a nutshell, is the fundamental difference which, ultimately, is where the long-term democratic advantage lies. In my opinion.
The paper also contains an interesting drill into the history of what makes democracies the way they are and you can access it in full via the following link The Cost of Democracy.
Happy Sunday.