Perhaps your article should have been titled:  The Myth Of Growth In Dictatorships vs Plutocracies.

It is convenient and idealistic to think of the U.S. as a democracy, but nothing could be further from the truth.  The U.S. may be many things, but in terms of government, it is NOT a democracy.  A plutocracy?  An aristocracy?  A meritocracy?  A tyranny in-the-making?

Many are quick to point out that freedoms such as the right to vote and the right to practice a particular religion is proof of a democratic government.  Perhaps they refer to the 'freedom' to vote within the systematically limited and protected system of the Electoral College?  Or the 'freedom' to practice a religion so long as it does not offend someone in the Executive Branch or other arms of the government?  Or perhaps they refer to the right to mount a public protest, so long as the Patriot Act doesn't deem it a threat to public safety?  Perhaps those who prefer to refer to the U.S. as a democracy have such short memories that they have forgotten that the bailouts for the insurance industry, banks, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the auto industry was done WITHOUT a vote from the citizenry, most of whom opposed such measures, burdening future generations for an undeterminable period of time.  (The argument that issues which could not be understood by the general public is a poor excuse at best, a blunt example of how the U.S. is not a democracy at its best [as were the passage of the Patriot Act, and other previous examples].)

'Democracy' in the U.S. is an illusion sustained to appease the unaware masses, and thus control them better via the illusion of choice.  Whether one wishes to believe the U.S. is a democracy--as one would believe in any particular religion--is relative to whether they prefer an illusion for the sake of personal comfort or 'maintaining the peace', as opposed to reality.  Sadly, propagating the illusion that the U.S. is a democracy severely cripples or obliterates the possibility of true change to come forth from future generations.  More disturbing is that many people prefer it that way--a system, no matter how flawed, often defends itself to the end.

Ivan: And you think China or Russia are better illustrations of democracy?

The core argument of the author about the superiority of democracies vs. the authoritarian regimes is hardly contestable. But the author apparently has poor knowledge of Turkey, which I happen to observe regularly. This country is undergoing a dramatic transformation, which may or may not lead it to becoming a stronger democracy and economy. Its success largely depends on the success of the reforms initiated by the government, - most notably, the ongoing attempts to adopt a new "civilian" constitution and the "Kurdish opening", - as well as the pace of the EU accession process.

My reading of the author is he is contrasting regimes that are personalised vis-a-vis regimes that function based on a system(however controversial). He predicts that the former is not sustainable in the long run. Democracy doesn't necessarily mean that people will think! but who said illusions ain't fascinating?

@AustinScaggs:  China and Russia are not democracies.  Irregardless of how China prefers to present itself to the world, it is a communist government reliant on a socialist experiment for economic growth.  (It is obvious they realized some time ago that communism does not work for long-term sustainability.)  Russia is not a democracy, but a socialist government.  Much to the chagrin of the U.S., Putin managed to put Russia in a respectable economic footing.  Russia still has many problems, some ingrained not necessarily in econmic strategy but more a problem of culture and perspective, but what Russia managed to do under Putin's reign was nothing short of remarkable.

In summary, I believe not one form of government is perfect--the are all prone to error, particularly with 'leaders' with misguided ideals and/or perceptions of the world.  So long as world governments are managed by the flawed personal reactions of its leaders--mixing religion and government is a prime example of what NOT to do--governments will falter and fail time and again.  Unfortunately, this is a pattern that may be in place until human civilization ceases to exist (past record being an undeniable indicator).

It would be shortsighted to not offer a solution in my dialogue.  (But, then again, who is actually listening?)

Initially, maintaining TRUE separation of governance and religion would be a necessity--many people cannot perceive how much religion affects government and policy, be it directly or indirectly.  (The argument that without religion and how it manifests itself in a positive manner in times of decisions by the justices of the Supreme Court is a reckless at best.)  That would require that the government body operate using logic and not emotion, facts as opposed to scare tactics, and scientific calculations of probability and observation of patterns as opposed to personal delusions.

I don't propose a utopia.  Nevertheless, from observation, my proposal requires a level of discipline humans may never achieve, irregardless of the passage of time.

CORRECTION:  '(The argument that without religion and how it manifests itself in a positive manner in times of decisions by the justices of the Supreme Court is a reckless at best.)', should have read:

(The argument that religion and how it manifests itself in a positive manner during times of decision, without which there is little chance for measurable progress in a society--for example, by justices of the Supreme Court in the U.S.--is a reckless assumption at best.)

hat0891: the author is Turkish... and I have to say I share his views on how Tukey becomes less of a democracy.

I find the article very weakly motivated. The concrete arguments given in the agrument would have basically supported any conclusion, like the absence of a strong  correlation between political system and economical performance, or even the opposite of what the author claims. Also the article doesn't talk at all about the huge influence the financial sector has on U.S. politics, culminating with the recent unprecedentent interventions of the U.S. government in the financial markets, which many see as a total failure of both US-style democracy and US-style capitalism. Does Rodrik's book give stronger arguments to support his claims?

The issue of what qualifies as a democracy seems like a long discussion for another day, but probably we can say that the US is more democratic than certain other places.

Second, there is an issue that I find myself considering when dealing with people who post comments, and it is the issue of perfection: In theis case the question/issue is, even if the US is not perfect, is it still good enough?  Norway may be more democratic, but must the expression of democracy be perfect in order to qualify?  How perfect does the US have to be? Does perfection exist in any event?

Really, what struck me in reading the analysis was that perhaps one could turn it around and propose that for certain size countries (so as to exclude Singapore, for example) the measure of government "democracy" is how well they are doing economically, and how well they deal with disasters, and stress, etc.  I mean, who really cares about some abstract term of Democracy?  Isn't it performance (benefit to the citizens in general from the economic production) that counts?  I suppose we would want to exclude or somehow deal with places like Kuwait which are simply sucking assets out of the ground.  So before trading liberty for wealth, it might be worth considering if the trade is ever successful.

In my view, political systems are a necessary condition for economic prosperity, but they are not sufficient. I would suggest that any setup that actively encourage the free exchange of ideas among its citizens will become a hotbed of economic activity and growth.

But what about Germany which has been quite authoritarian in the economy in relation to US?

And, US has been increasingly authoritative as well!

Chee-Heong Quah

In this subject Mr. rodrik is not objective anymore. His father in law a retired general is allaged to military coup in turkey.

now his is trying to convince us democratically selected goverment is more dictator than a military coup leader and   It is turkey where military coup has been done 5 times since the 1960. And they hanged one elected primeminister and two minister and the other peoples.

Mr. you can not be objective in this case.

That’s right, democracy and economic growth are complementary each other. In fact the authoritarian growth just warrants the unbridled speed with an inherent brewing up entropy of underlying discontent and deprivation with a divided and discriminating distribution of wealth (mostly crony capitalism just feeding the upper layers of the society the best and hardly trickles to the bottom of the society for ill reformed institutions). So in any case India in its most vibrant democracy (with all woes and worries) certainly triumphs over China in the long run where the speed of growth is neither sustainable nor equitable.

In fact innovation , creativity the life blood of any economy for long term race can easily relate to democracy where the pressure valve of discontent  always help in routinely  cleansing the bugs from the socio political system. But totalitarian govt is less compatible to this cleansing process or debugging process.And when they crack down on the society , its basically just creates a big fire wall to restrict its liberty as well as smooth functioning of the people both.

democracy has it own perils slow decision making a byproduct of seeking consensus among the stake holder ie people but it is far superior way of governance than any form of authoritarianism.singapore is an exception but i dont think any other country has come close to that one may be the size was not similar.china is an economic powerhouse no doubt but it is so opaque that we dont know what is happening there.whether people are prospering or not whether they have a stake in the economic growth.we dont know whether growth takes into account the environmental concerns,freedom of expression etc.to quote a recent example in indian state of orissa which is rich in bauxite main ingredient to make aluminium vedanta resources which is listed in london stock exchange was denied permission to mine becoz of environmental concerns and tribal resistance  so these are the virtues of democracy where people have say in their future.i doubt whether these are taken into account when china or any country which has no democracy embarks on a path of economic growth.what world needs is inclusive growth not a growth where very few people prosper and majority are left out this can happen only in a vibrant democracy.i still vividly remember lee kuan yew criticising indian democracy for its slow decision making process yep india makes slow decision but if it makes decision it results in empowering its people economically.let us hope that democracy takes deep roots world wide.

In my opinion, the answer of the question "Which is better for economic growth – a strong guiding hand or plurality?" depends on the developmental stage of the country. If the country is far from the advanced contries in terms of productive capacity, the target is obvious "adoption of the existing best technologies". Adoption doesn't need new ideas. It requires determinism, focus and discipline. And these needs can be easily met in an authoritian regime. In fact, a poor functioning democratic regime may undermine the effectiveness of technology adoption through rent-seeking etc. However, as the countries converge to the advanced countries, then the gains from tech. adoption would diminish. In this point, creative thinking and new ideas are needed. An authoritian regime is not able to provide appropriate environment for free thinking and new ideas that would hinder further improvement in economic prosperity.