When Superpowers Prop Up Governments

More than five years on, it shouldn't surprise us that Iraq and Afghanistan are still deeply unstable, suggests new work from NYU economist and author William Easterly.

Along with Shanker Satyanath and Daniel Berger, also of NYU, Easterly looked at the level of democracy a country achieved after the Soviet Union or the United States propped up its leader during the Cold War. The investigation was made possible thanks to recent declassification of both CIA and KGB documents.

The researchers identify 40 countries where new leaders were installed by superpowers -- 24 by the U.S. and 16 by the U.S.S.R. They then looked at how an intervention in one five-year period affected the level of democracy in the next five-year period.

Their results, outlined in a new NBER working paper (free version), show that when either the U.S. or Soviet Union stepped in, the level of democracy -- as measured by whether there was a turnover in office after an election -- fell by roughly 33 percent. The researchers also found that when the two superpowers meddled, but failed to change regimes, democracy still suffered.

It might be obvious why democracy would fall after the Soviets propped up a leader, but what about the U.S.? Well, when a country's leader is installed by outside forces, the desires of the internal population are circumvented. To maintain power, it's in the interest of the propped-up leader to deal harshly with his opponents and in the process create a more repressive regime. And a country like the U.S. has little incentive to stop that process because it's primary concern is typically security, not democracy.

What does this say about the current U.S. war on terror? The researchers write:

To the extent that US leaders continue to share the Cold War world view that repressing anti-US groups overseas enhances security, the US government has incentives to install leaders who have powerful incentives to repress anti-US groups in their countries. It is clear that under these conditions our findings offer a negative prognosis for democracy in intervened countries.