Another quick note. I suspect answering the question “Does democracy increase resilience to catastrophes?” with “In general, yes” is too much of an oversimplification. I expect the answer is more like “In general, yes under X conditions, no under Y, and we do not know under Z”. Relatedly, it looks like democracy and human rights are only associated with higher welfare holding income constant in some countries, and controlling for income makes sense to me if the institutional qualities of democracy per se do not cause economic growth.
Hi Florian,
Another quick note. I suspect answering the question “Does democracy increase resilience to catastrophes?” with “In general, yes” is too much of an oversimplification. I expect the answer is more like “In general, yes under X conditions, no under Y, and we do not know under Z”. Relatedly, it looks like democracy and human rights are only associated with higher welfare holding income constant in some countries, and controlling for income makes sense to me if the institutional qualities of democracy per se do not cause economic growth.