ABSTRACT
The relationship between development and democracy is a very strong finding. Dozens of quantitative studies have tested this relationship and although they differed in many ways, they all found it to be positive. Higher levels of development generate a significantly higher probability of democratic government. Class structure is considered as an important intervening factor: economic development expands the size of the middle class and/or working class in a non-democratic regime, causing such a regime to have a high probability of collapsing and undergoing a transition to democracy.
