GAZDASÁGI FEJLŐDÉS ÉS POLITIKAI DEMOKRÁCIA
Economic Development and Political Democracy

Summary/Abstract: The relationship between economic development and political democracy may be characterized in six different ways: (1) economic development is a precondition of political democracy, or economic development is conducive to political democracy; (2) economic development impedes or endangers the functioning of political democracy; (3) political democracy is conducive to economic development; (4) political democracy impedes economic development. Propositions (1)–(4) share the assumption that there is a close and intrinsic relationship between economic development and political democracy. This assumption is denied by the last two propositions: (5) economic development does not support and does not impede political democracy; (6) political democracy does not support and does not impede economic development. I make an attempt at reconstructing these propositions and analyzing their relationship in this essay. The first and the third propositions argue in favour of the structural correspondence, the second and the fourth propositions argue in favour of the structural confl ict between capitalism and democracy. Since the structural confl ict of capitalism and democracy is built on their structural correspondence, analytically these propositions do not exclude one another. The propositions stating the indifference of capitalism and democracy do not say that there are no interactions between economic development and political democracy, instead they say that the effects of these interactions may be different due to different historical circumstances, consequently on the basis of pure analytical reasoning one can deduce neither the thesis that economic development is the necessary and/or sufficient condition of political democracy nor that political democracy is the necessary and/or sufficient condition of economic development.

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