Capitalism, Development, and Democracy

Capitalism and Democracy*

Capitalism, Democracy and Ralph's Pretty Good Grocery

alph's Pretty Good Grocery, for those like me who miss popular culture allusions, is a fictional shop in the imaginary Minnesota town of Lake Wobegon, a place invented by the humorist Garrison Keilor. Its slogan is 'If you can't get it at Ralph's, you can probably get along without it'. For political scientist John Mueller, this slogan sums up capitalism and democracy. They may not supply every...

Distorted Democracy and Freedom of the Press under Capitalism

This study examines the issue of standards of freedom of the press in democracy. Freedom of the press should benefit citizens in democratic societies, yet historically, the press has mainly served dominant group interests that are based on capital and power. The problem of serving special interests and collusion exists globally. It examines how well the principle of press freedom operates in de...

Global Capitalism and Sustainable Development

This paper was prepared as a background paper for the panel on “Global Capitalism and Sustainable Development” in the International Conference on Global Ethos to be held at the United Nations University in Tokyo, Japan, in October 2000. It surveys the major issues involved in defining sustainability, and the relationship thereof to development and the behaviour of capitalist economies. A partic...

Economic Development and Democracy

■ Abstract In this essay, I review recent research on the effects of economic development on democracy. On the theoretical side, for the first time there has been a systematic attempt to bring the types of formal models developed by economists and political scientists outside of comparative politics to bear on the origins of democracy. I present a simple analytical framework that captures some ...