Measuring Political Institutions in the Long Run: A Latent Variable Analysis of Political Regimes, 1810–2018

Abstract

In this article, latent variable analysis is used to construct hybrid measure of political development based on the plausible common variation between objective and subjective indicators of political institutions. For a sample of 167 countries for the period 1810–2018, we chart long-term paths of political development. Our empirical strategy attempts to overcome the existing potential bias in the measures of democracy in the long run by extracting the institutional characteristics of political regimes, voter turnout, expert-based assessments and electoral outcomes into two latent indices of political development that can be compared both across space and time. The evidence reveals the remarkable persistence of multiple peaks in the world distribution of political development and uncovers contrasting long-term trajectories across countries traditionally featured in the political economy literature. Our findings add to the current debate about measurement of democratic backsliding.