Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-8ctnn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-28T00:09:49.521Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Government Partisanship, Labor Organization, and Macroeconomic Performance

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2014

R. Michael Alvarez ,
Geoffrey Garrett  and
Peter Lange
R. Michael Alvarez
Affiliation:
Duke University
Geoffrey Garrett
Affiliation:
Stanford University
Peter Lange
Affiliation:
Duke University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Governments of the Left and Right have distinct partisan economic policies and objectives that they would prefer to pursue. Their propensity to do so, however, is constrained by their desire for reelection. We argue that the ability of governments to further their partisan interests and preside over reelectable macroeconomic outcomes simultaneously is dependent on the organization of the domestic economy, particularly the labor movement. We hypothesize that there are two different paths to desirable macroeconomic performance. In countries with densely and centrally organized labor movements, leftist governments can promote economic growth and reduce inflation and unemployment. Conversely, in countries with weak labor movements, rightist governments can pursue their partisan-preferred macroeconomic strategies and achieve similarly beneficial macroeconomic outcomes. Performance will be poorer in other cases. These hypotheses are supported by analysis of pooled annual time series data for 16 advanced industrial democracies between 1967 and 1984.

Type
Research Notes
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 85 , Issue 2 , June 1991 , pp. 539 - 556
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1991

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alesina, Alberto. 1989. “Politics and Business Cycles in Industrial Democracies.” Economic Policy 8:57–98.Google Scholar
Alesina, Alberto, and Roubini, Nouriel. 1990. “Political Cycles: Evidence from OECD Economies.” Presented at the Conference on Economic Policy in Political Equilibrium, Stockholm.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alt, James. 1985. “Political Parties, World Demand, and Unemployment.” American Political Science Review 79:1016–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alvarez, R. Michael, Garrett, Geoffrey, and Lange, Peter. 1990. “What's ‘Left’ in the Politics of the Political Business Cycle? Government Partisanship, Policy Uncertainty, and Macroeconomic Performance.” Presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, San Francisco.Google Scholar
Beck, Nathaniel. 1982. “Parties, Administrations, and American Macroeconomic Outcomes.” American Political Science Review 76:83–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blanchard, Olivier J., and Summers, Lawrence H.. 1986. “Hysteresis and the European Unemployment Problem.” National Bureau of Economic Research Macroeconomic Annual. Cambridge: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Bosworth, Barry P., and Rivlin, Alice M., eds. 1987. The Swedish Economy. Washington: Brookings Institution.Google Scholar
Bruno, Michael, and Sachs, Jeffrey D.. 1985. Economics of Worldwide Stagflation. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Calmfors, Lars, and Driffill, John. 1988. “Bargaining Structure, Corporatism, and Macroeconomic Performance.” Economic Policy 3:13–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cameron, David R. 1984. “Social Democracy, Corporatism, Labour Quiescence, and the Representation of Economic Interest in Advanced Capitalist Society.” In Order and Conflict in Contemporary Capitalism, ed. Goldthorpe, John H.. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Castles, Francis. 1978. The Social Democratic Image of Society. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Castles, Francis. 1989. “Democratic Politics, War, and Catch-up.” Australian National University. Typescript.Google Scholar
Castles, Francis, and Dowrick, Steve. 1988. “The Impact of Government Spending Levels on Medium-term Economic Growth in the OECD, 1960–1985.” Discussion Paper No. 199. Center for Economic Policy Research, Australian National University.Google Scholar
Chappell, Henry, and Keech, William. 1988. “Choice and Circumstance: The Consequences of Partisan Macroeconomic Policies.” Presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, Washington.Google Scholar
Cross, Rod, ed. 1988. Unemployment, Hysteresis, and the Natural Rate Hypothesis. New York: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Downs, Anthony. 1957. An Economic Theory of Democracy. New York: Harper & Row.Google Scholar
Esping-Anderson, Gosta, and Korpi, Walter. 1984. “Social Policy As Class Politics in Post-War Capitalism: Scandinavia, Austria, and Germany.” In Order and Conflict in Contemporary Capitalism, ed. Goldthorpe, John H.. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Fiorina, Morris. 1981. Retrospective Voting in American National Elections. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Friedrich, Robert. 1982. “In Defense of Multiplicative Terms in Multiple Regression Equations.” American Journal of Political Science 26: 797–833.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garrett, Geoffrey. 1990. “Between Autonomy and Constraint: Government Economics Strategies among the Advanced Industrial Democracies.” Stanford University. Typescript.Google Scholar
Garrett, Geoffrey, and Lange, Peter. 1986. “Performance in a Hostile World: Economic Growth in Capitalist Democracies, 1974–1982.” World Politics 38(4): 517–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garrett, Geoffrey, and Lange, Peter. 1989. “Government Partisanship and Economic Performance: When and How Does ‘Who Governs’ Matter?” Journal of Politics 51:676–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garrett, Geoffrey, and Lange, Peter. 1990. “Political Responses to International Economic Decline, 1974–1984.” Duke University. Typescript.Google Scholar
Hibbs, Douglas A. 1974. “Problems of Statistical Estimation and Causal Inference in Dynamic Time Series Models.” In Sociological Methodology 1973/1974, ed. Costner, Herbert. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.Google Scholar
Hibbs, Douglas. 1977. “Political Parties and Macro-economic Policy.” American Political Science Review 71:1467–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hibbs, Douglas A. 1987. The American Political Economy. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hicks, Alexander. 1988. “Social Democratic Corporatism and Economic Growth.” Journal of Politics 50:677–704.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hicks, Alexander, and Swank, Duane. 1984. “On the Political Economy of Welfare Expansion.” Comparative Political Studies 17:81–119.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hicks, Alexander, and Patterson, William. 1989. “On the Robustness of the Left Corporatist Model of Economic Growth.” Journal of Politics 51:662–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hsiao, Cheng. 1986. Analysis of Panel Data. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jackman, Robert. 1986. “Elections and the Democratic Class Struggle.” World Politics 39:123–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackman, Robert. 1987. “The Politics of Economic Growth in the Industrial Democracies, 1974–1980.” Journal of Politics 49:242–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackman, Robert. 1989. “The Politics of Growth, Once Again.” Journal of Politics 51:646–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johnston, J. 1984. Econometric Methods. 3d ed.New York: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Judge, George G., Hill, R. Carter, Griffiths, William E., Lütkepohl, Helmut, and Lee, Tsoung-chao. 1988. Introduction to the Theory and Practice of Econometrics. New York: John Wiley & Sons.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Katzenstein, Peter. 1985. Small States in World Markets. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Kiewiet, D. Roderick. 1983. Macroeconomics and Micropolitics. Chicago: Chicago University Press.Google Scholar
Kirschen, Etienne S. 1964. Economic Policy in Our Time. Amsterdam: North Holland.Google Scholar
Kmenta, Jan. 1971. Elements of Econometrics. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Lange, Peter, and Garrett, Geoffrey. 1985. “The Politics of Growth: Strategic Interaction and Economic Performance in the Advanced Industrial Democracies, 1974–1980.” Journal of Politics 47:792–827.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lange, Peter, and Garrett, Geoffrey. 1987. “The Politics of Growth Reconsidered.” Journal of Politics 49:257–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lipset, Seymour Martin. 1983. 2d ed.Political Man. Garden City: Anchor.Google Scholar
Martin, Andrew. 1984. “Trade Unions in Sweden: Strategic Responses to Change and Crisis.” In Unions and Economic Crisis, by Gourevitch, Peter, et al. London: George Allen & Unwin.Google Scholar
Olson, Mancur. 1982. The Rise and Decline of Nations. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development. 1987. Historical Statistics 1960–1985. Paris: OECD.Google Scholar
Piachaud, David. 1978. “Inflation and Income Distribution.” In The Political Economy of Inflation, ed. Hirsch, Fred and Goldthorpe, John H.. London: Martin Robertson.Google Scholar
Sayrs, Lois W. 1989. Pooled Time Series Analysis. Newbury Park: Sage.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scharpf, Fritz W. 1984. “Economic and Institutional Constraints of Full-Employment Strategies: Sweden, Austria, and West Germany, 1974–1982.” In Order and Conflict in Contemporary Capitalism, ed. Goldthorpe, John H.. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Schott, Kerry. 1984. Policy, Power, and Order. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Soskice, David. 1990. “Providing the Infrastructure for International Competitiveness: A Comparative Institutional Perspective.” Berlin: Wissenschaftszentrum für Sozialforschung.Google Scholar
Stimson, James A. 1985. “Regression in Space and Time: A Statistical Essay.” American Journal of Political Science 29(4): 914–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Streeck, Wolfgang. 1989. “Skills and the Limits of Neo-Liberalism: The Enterprise of the Future As a Place of Learning.” Work, Employment, and Society 3(1): 89–104.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Streeck, Wolfgang, and Schmitter, Philippe C.. 1985. “Community, Market, State—and Associations? The Prospective of Interest Governance to Social Order.” In Private Interest Government: Beyond Market and State. Beverly Hills: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Swank, Duane. 1989. “Partisan Policy: Political Parties, Economic Interest Representation, and Fiscal Policies in the Capitalist Democracies, 1970–1985.” Marquette University. Typescript.Google Scholar
Woolley, John T. 1984. Monetary Politics: The Federal Reserve and the Politics of Monetary Policy. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.