Why do richer democracies survive? - (Post)-modernization and Unconventional Political Participation.

Since Seymour Lipset's (1959) seminal article on the social prerequisites of democracy many scholars have found a strong empirical correlation between per capita income and democracy. More recent studies have refined these findings, concluding that this relationship is mostly driven by the tendency of richer states to sustain and consolidate democracy once they have democratized. However, the causal mechanism that drives this correlation is still unclear. By using a multivariate cross-country analysis, this paper attempts to determine one possible causal pathway by establishing the link between material wealth and unconventional political participation. Drawing on data for 39 democracies, which was collected from the World Value Survey, this analysis reveals that there is a significant positive relationship between a state's GDP per capita and its levels of unconventional political participation. This is an important finding, as it bridges the democratization and modernization/ post-modernization literature. Most likely because they embrace post-modernist values, populaces in richer countries show higher levels of unconventional political participation, which then in turn help solidifying democratic institutions and governments. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]