Evaluation of the Relationship of Democracy and Governance: An Empirical Analysis

Keywords: democracy index, determinants of democracy, governance indicators, good governance, statistical analysis

Abstract

Economic, social, political and technological developments around the world have greatly influenced the field of public administration, and new paradigms have been introduced accordingly. The Governance Approach, which was put forward by the World Bank and marked the restructuring reforms of the state in a short time, has become a new stage in the state-society relations. Instead of the management approach in which the state is accepted as the only actor in decision-making processes, the World Bank has put forward a participatory management approach. The governance approach, which deals with controversial issues such as changing the government-citizen relationship, strengthening democracy, improving the service delivery capacity of the government, and the rule of law, has the opportunity to be applied at global, national and local levels. Moreover, due to the governance approach, there has been a transition from the state-centred management approach to the democracy-centred management approach. Within the scope of this study, the effect of governance approach on democracy is investigated by focusing on the concepts of governance and democracy. Accordingly, the theoretical claim that governance has an impact on democracy is tested by various empirical analyses using quantitative data. The Worldwide Governance Indicator data published by the World Bank for 214 countries and the Democracy Index data prepared by The Economist Intelligent Unit for 165 countries were used in the analysis. Governance and democracy data for the last ten years (2009-2018) were included in the research. These data were prepared in six sub-dimensions for governance and five sub-dimensions for democracy. In this study, governance and democracy were analysed statistically with both main dimensions and sub-dimensions. Forty-two different hypotheses were tested within the scope of the research. As a result, it has been determined that governance and its six sub-dimensions have a very high effect on democracy and its five sub-dimensions.

Published
2021-12-30
Section
Articles