What makes democracies fall, endure and rise? Does economic development rise as an outcome of democracies? Do democracies also rise as an outcome of economic development? What happens to democracies when there is a rapid increase in economic development? Are there theories that can explain some level of development and extents to which democracies are bound to fail? The purpose of this development is to attempt to provide answers to the above questions and set aside theories that can explain the dynamics between economic development and political regimes.

A significant population of the present global economy has believed that democracy and economic development have a reciprocal impact on each other. For instance, most communists have believed that economic development is as a result of more democratic political structures that reinforce the rights of citizens. Economic conditions might have beneficial or adverse impacts on democracy. To begin with, economic hardships can change democratic regimes. Democratic societies are more vulnerable to ugly economic condition and at the same time democracy is equally vulnerable to bad economic conditions. Przeworski (1991) in explanation of the relationship between economic development and democracy declares that for development to occur there must be a favorable environment. Therefore, for the democracy is preferred for the reason of economic development.

It can also be argued that when the right to own property is protected among other citizen rights as opposed to an authoritarian democracy, the economic development occurs. The main point behind this argument is that if there are a few rich people, the property rights of these few existing rich people could be threatened because a majority of the country’s population is struggling with poverty. In a nutshell, economic development can be achieved only when political democracy is granted so that economic rights can take its course. Assurance in individual economic freedom brings an assurance of a stable political regime (Nathan 2013).

In attempts to explain significant theories that are behind the causal relationship between political regimes and economic development, Bipartisan Statement of Principles by Center for American Progress and CSIS (2003), explains the endogenous modernization theory. Behind modernization theory, there is an assumption that because modernization is a gradual process of specialization and differentiation of social constructions, it leads to the segregation of political structures from the rest of societal structures making democracy possible. There are also specific causal chains that hold together societal structures; education, political incorporation, mobilization, communication, urbanization, industrialization among other factors. Progressive accumulation of these factors when it comes to social transformation is what leads the society to a state of democratization. Modernization could be one of the reasons for the relationship between economic development and democracy.

If underdeveloped countries would become as rich as advanced nations, there is a higher probability that they would end up being political democracies; the higher the chance of a nation becoming ‘a well to do nation’ the higher their possibility of becoming a democratic nation. Even if the rise of democracy is independent from the level of economic development, there is a chance that the developed regime will survive if it established in an affluent country; that is a country that combines all the factors of modernization. We would therefore expect democracies to randomly appear with reference to the level of economic development but survive in wealthier countries and die in poorer ones.