The Missing Link? Modernization, Tolerance, and Legislation on Homosexuality

Abstract

Research suggests that modernization is an important driver of liberalization in the field of gay and lesbian rights. Surprisingly, it has often been assumed—but not empirically examined—that a culture of tolerance mediates the relationship between socioeconomic modernization and liberal legislation. This article closes this gap by analyzing the seventy-three countries that took part in the fifth and sixth waves of the World Values Survey. As government responsiveness to public attitudes is structurally enforced by means of electoral accountability in democracies, but not in autocracies, we, in addition, distinguish between these regime types in an analysis of moderated mediation. We show that tolerant attitudes toward homosexuals do, indeed, mediate the influence of modernization on gay and lesbian rights policies in democracies, but not in autocracies. The result is confirmed by extensive robustness checks, including an instrumental variables approach to account for a potential reverse causality between tolerance and rights. The study does not only underline the relevance of cultural aspects of modernization, but also points to the crucial importance of regime type for a translation of public opinion into policy.