CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION  Background to the Research Problem

Evidence found in the works of scholars in comparative politics of several decades in development studies shows that democracy leads to economic development or economic development provides opportunities for democratization. The latter confirms to a large extent, the hypotheses made by Lipset that the state of an economy can influence the democratization process (Christie, 1998a). A growing concern is to explore the correlation between forms of government and the levels of economic development that a country enjoys. This has been explored by some scholars and concluded that people living under matured democracies are generally economically advanced than those living under any form of government, particularly authoritarian regimes. The nexus between democracy and economic development in recent past indicates a strong correlation between them. However, the debate has changed over time. The third wave of democratization across the African continent changed the debate to how democracy could rather foster economic development.

The influential book of Samuel Huntington, “The Third Wave”, announced the notions of “waves of democratization” in world politics. The first wave occurred between 1826 and 1926, marking the emergence of democratic regimes in the early 19th century (Doorenspleet, 2000, p. 385). “The reverse wave occurred by the end the Second World War, and the third, beginning of the mid- 1970s” which led to a global swing and brought states back to democracies. Hungtington, however, stressed that there was evidence of a third reversal in the third wave of democracies back to authoritarianism at the time of his writing (Huntington, 1993).

Sociologist Lipset in his work pointed out a linear correlation of economic development transforming from authoritarian states to democracies. He argued that the notion of economic development for democracy survived the test then concluded that, advanced nations turn to be more democratic than the poor countries (Lipset, 1959). Similarly, matured democracies are generally economically advanced than countries living under any other form of government, particularly authoritarian regimes.

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