The Virtuous/ Vicious Circles

今日は第11章と第12章。エリート支配から成長経路に入れた国と入れなかった国について描かれています。

第11章 The Virtuous Circle

How institutions that encourage prosperity create positive feedback loops that prevent the efforts by elites to undermine them.

The rule of law is a very strange concept when you think about it in historical perspective. Why should laws be applied equally to all? If the king and the aristocracy have political power and the rest don't, it's only natural that whatever is fair game for the king and the aristocracy should be banned and punishable for the rest. Indeed, the rule of law is not imaginable under absolutist political institutions. It is a creation of pluralist political institutions and of the broad coalitions that support such pluralism. It's only when many individuals and groups have a say in decisions, and the political power to have a seat at the table, that the idea that they should all be treated fairly starts making sense.

第12章 The Vicious Circle

How institutions that create poverty generate negative feedback loops and endure.

As pitiful as this might sound, it was better than what the farmers were getting during Stevens's reign, which had often been as low as 10 percent - that is, 90 percent of the income of the farmers was extracted by Stevens's government, and not to provide public services, such as roads or education, but to enrich himself and his coronies and to buy political support.

The U.S. South shows another, more resilient side of the vicious circle: as in Guatemala, the southern planter elite remained in power and structured economic and political institutions in order to ensure the continuity of its power. But differntly from Guatemala, it was faced with significant challenges after its defeat in the Civil War, which abolished slavery and reversed the total, constitutional exclusion of blacks from political participation.

The vicious circle turned out to be stronger than many, including Abraham Lincoln, had thought. The vicious circle is based on extractive political institutions creating extractive economic institutions, which in turn support the extractive political institutions, which in turn support the extractive political institutions, because economic wealth and power buy political power.

As virtuous circles make inclusive institutions persist, vicious circles create powerful forces toward the persistence of extractive institutions.